Twin Sirens: A Chase & Marshall One-Shot Collection
by PyreFly77
Summary: STORIES CONTAINED: RETURN TO FEAR, MINDING THE MEDIC, BOILING OVER, WHATEVER IT TAKES, ERUPTION, MOVIE NIGHT, ULTIMATE DANGER Through nightmares and sickness, bad days and troubled times, arguments, times of play and even extreme danger, Chase and Marshall have been through it all. These are but a handful of the times the two have shared.
1. Return to Fear: A Primary Fears Sequel

_**RETURN TO FEAR (a sequel to Primary Fears)**_

**It has been three months since Marshall, Rocky and Chase were scarred by horrific nightmares. And ever since then their dreams have never gotten that bad again. Until Chase suffers a dream that causes him to question how good a friend and leader he is. But even with no Ryder to comfort him, Chase intends to uphold his promise to not keep secrets anymore.**

* * *

2:30AM.

Normally, at this point at night, the Lookout would be entirely silent, without even the smallest amount of activity. Ryder and all the pups would usually be fast asleep at this time of night, and indeed, all of the pups were resting in preparation for the next day ahead of them.

All but one.

As much as he struggled, a certain german sheperd pup simply could not go back to sleep after a nightmare jolted him awake an hour ago. Even his secret favourite teddy, Officer Bear, wasn't of any help in calming his mind. As much as he tried to brush off his dream, it was all he could think about, much to his chagrin.

It was only three months ago that Chase, Rocky and Marshall had all suffered nightmares so horrific that they were effectively incapacitated, and although their dreams had been mostly peaceful up until that point, Chase had prayed over and over that their minds wouldn't concoct something so traumatic again. But while this dream wasn't outwardly-traumatic, it still struck Chase as eerily-prophetic. Something that wasn't entirely out of the realm of possibility. His wish was simply not to be.

The fourth giant sigh of the night escaped Chase's lips as he took another look at the clock in the ceiling of his pup house. The feeling of deja vu was not a pleasant one. And what made matters worse was that even though he needed the comforting words of his owner, Ryder was unfortunately confined to the hospital for the night for observation purposes. Of course, the one mission Chase wasn't there for was the one mission where Ryder ended up with a hairline fracture to his hand after a piece of falling debris clipped him. Thankfully, the piece of debris wasn't very large, but it was evidently large enough to take Ryder away from Chase when he really needed him.

But the memories of Ryder's comfort caused another memory to play in Chase's head. One where he was crying deeply, surrounded by Rocky and Marshall doing their absolute best to calm him down and reassure him that they were there for him. Chase shut his eyes and smiled, before a lightbulb turned on in his head.

He, Rocky and Marshall had reassured each other countless times that they'd always be there for one another, and that Marshall had been very clear in what he wanted. All he wanted was for Chase to not hide his feelings. And that he couldn't help if the problem had stayed locked away in Chase's head. Deciding that it was probably better to let Rocky rest after a grueling day of inventing, Chase rose up, stretched, and set off towards the red pup house.

Chase couldn't help but feel jealous upon getting a good look at the dozing dalmatian before him. Marshall was obviously having a better night's sleep than he was, lying completely silent and still. Chase didn't really want to wake Marshall up so late at night when he was clearly sleeping so well. But then Chase envisioned the next morning. He envisioned Marshall quizzing him on why he looked so tired, and Marshall's face of sad disappointment when he learned that Chase was hiding his feelings again. Realising that this is what Marshall would probably want, Chase steeled himself.

"No more secrets..." the shepherd whispered to himself, leaning in and gently nuzzling the speckled pup, who stirred slightly in response.

"Mmmmmrrrrrgghhhh… blllluuugghhh..." Chase couldn't help but smirk ruefully at how much Marshall looked like a zombie as he slowly dragged himself back into consciousness. "...gruuuuhhh-huh? Ch… Chase…?" Marshall mumbled with his eyes only marginally open, slowly registering the brown pup close to his face.

"Hey, Marshall..." Chase whispered.

"Is… everything… OK?" Marshall sounded worried. Perhaps not for nothing, as he wasn't used to Chase actively waking him at night.

"Well, kinda…" Chase replied with an oddly-downcast expression. "There's no emergency or anything, but..."

"You sure? You look kinda sad..."

"Well, I had a pretty bad nightmare… Now I can't sleep."

Marshall's heart sank. "Oh, not again…" he whimpered.

He didn't outright say it, but it was clear that Marshall had been hoping for no further nightmares, too. And those hopes had just been cruelly dashed.

"How long ago was that?" Marshall went on.

"About an hour…" Chase replied, staring sadly at the floor. "I tried to go back to sleep, but… I can't stop thinking about it… Or you."

Marshall stiffened at the last two words before cocking his head. "Me? I'm guessing I was part of that dream?"

"Yeah..."

"Right." The now fully-awake Marshall swiftly got to his paws. "Let's take this somewhere quiet, huh?"

Chase's expression quickly shifted to one of confused surprise. "Wait. Just like that?"

"Just like that. If you had a dream that made it so you couldn't sleep and had to come wake me up, its gotta have been bad, right?" Marshall gave Chase a reassuring smile. "Besides… A couple of months ago, you would've tried to keep that to yourself… I'm really glad you wanna share it this time."

Chase couldn't help but return Marshall's smile. It was in that moment that Chase realised that he made the right choice.

"Oh, before we go, there's something we need..." Marshall stopped abruptly, before turning around and moving to Chase's pup house.

"Really? What's that?"

"Oh, don't play dumb..."

Marshall dipped into Chase's pup house before swiftly coming back out with a familiar object in his mouth. Chase's eyes went wide.

"Officer Bear? We 'need' him?" Chase asked, swiftly averting his gaze in embarrassment. "Uh, I really don't think he's necessary..."

"Oh, no…" Marshall replied with a knowing grin, having gently set the bear down on the floor in front of him. "I think his services are very much required for a time like tonight."

Chase wouldn't tell anyone this, but his nightmares left him sleeping with Officer Bear every night a few months ago. But sadly, Chase's cherished puppyhood toy could only do so much in the face of nightmares that terrifying.

"But… what… good is he gonna do?" Chase's tone was halting. He knew full-well why he needed Officer Bear, but that didn't change his hesitance towards sleeping with him with another pup watching. "Why do we need an old teddy?"

Marshall rolled his eyes. "OK, Chase, if it makes you feel any better..."

Marshall swiftly trotted back to his own pup house, only to return seconds later with his own teddy in his mouth, carefully depositing it on the floor in front of Chase.

"You've really got nothing to be embarrassed about. We all know you still sleep with Officer Bear sometimes. We don't think any less of you for it." Marshall reassured Chase.

"But… isn't Officer Bear… childish?" Chase went on falteringly.

"Chase…" Marshall gave Chase a look that was a mixture of amusement and exasperation. "You do realize who you're talking to, right? Besides, you're only a year older than me. There's no hurry to grow up."

Finally, Chase saw fit to concede the argument after searching his brain for a rejoinder. "...you win."

Marshall smiled again. "I know I do."

With their respective teddies in their mouths, the two quietly headed into the Lookout. Chase had wondered if they were going to end up in the corner like when he found Marshall crying in terror like a puppy. A few seconds passed of Chase glancing around the room before Marshall got his attention.

"Chase. Over here." Marshall called out around the bear in his mouth.

"Huh? The elevator? Where are we…?" Then it hit him. Chase quickly realised what Marshall was insinuating. "Wait. No. We can't sleep in Ryder's bed!"

"Oh, he won't mind!" Marshall couldn't help but smile at the indignant look on his friend's face. "Besides, its not like he's using it right now! We can make it for him when we're done, right?"

With a muffled sigh, Chase decided to just go with it, hoping that Ryder wouldn't be angry at the two stealing his bed. "Why Ryder's bed, anyway?" he asked asked as the elevator began to ascend.

"It's one of the comfiest places I know." Marshall replied, thinking back to the night Ryder and Chase had comforted him in his time of need. "And I wanna make sure you're comfortable when you're talking about your nightmares."

Chase didn't feel any less apprehensive as he followed Marshall towards Ryder's room. The door to which was left open from when Ryder rushed into action that day. Of course, being sent to hospital partway through didn't leave him much time to return home to shut said door, allowing the two pups to slip in and hop onto the bed.

Marshall wasted no time in wriggling under the covers and getting comfortable with his own teddy, leaving only his head visible on the pillow, giving Chase an expectant look. Realising that he wasn't going to be winning this, Chase joined Marshall in awkwardly squirming under the covers with Officer Bear. But once he'd gotten settled right next to Marshall, the warm bed combined with the comfort of Officer Bear began to calm him down immediately.

"Wow… You know…" Chase mumbled. "...you were right… I just… just hope… Ryder doesn't… mind too much..." Chase's eyed started to drift closed, fighting a losing battle against sleep.

"Hey! Don't fall asleep on me yet!" Marshall reached over and briefly shook Chase, jolting him awake to the sight of a grinning dalmatian.

"Oh, uh, sorry, heh."

"Alright." Marshall's tone turned gentler as his face shifted to a more serious one. "What did you dream about? What happened?"

Chase's face fell as he realised it was time to get down to brass tacks. "Well… Marshall…" Chase began. "Am I a jerk?"

"Huh? Wh-what does-? Wait. Is that what you dreamed about?"

"Kinda. But seriously. Do you think… I'm mean?"

"Do you really want me to answer that?"

"Yes!" Chase hissed, slightly annoyed at Marshall avoiding the question.

"Well, OK…" Marshall braced himself as he prepared to give his thoughts. "You can be pretty bossy and stubborn sometimes… And a little overprotective..."

Chase immediately got a sad look. "I thought so..."

"But you're not a jerk!" Marshall continued in a hurry. "Not by a long shot!"

"Well, that's what I dreamed about! I dreamed that I was yelling at you!"

"Yelling at me?" Marshall's brow furrowed. "Chase, that's not THAT weird… I mean, whenever any of us do something dangerous, you yell at us."

"Not like this! This time I was… really screaming at you!" Chase shouted, clearly being more affected than Marshall first thought. "I was… so angry at you, but I can't remember why!"

Marshall initially thought that Chase's nightmare couldn't have been that bad. But seeing how distressed the shepherd was getting was rapidly changing his mind. In truth, the trifecta of bad dreams from three months ago had slightly desensitised Marshall to bad dreams. But seeing Chase' distress was forcing him to reevaluate his position.

"Do you… at least remember what you said?" Marshall whispered gently.

"I think there was stuff like… 'You don't belong on the team', 'You're so useless'… What else… 'All you do is screw up', 'You're just a stupid clown'… All kinds of horrible things..." Chase squeezed his eyes shut as he recalled all of the insults he'd thrown at Marshall in his dream.

"That's a little like what I dreamed of…" Marshall remarked, a shiver coursing through his spine as he recalled his own bad dream. "Chase, do you actually think like that?"

Chase's reaction was immediate. As if Marshall's words triggered something within him. Chase rapidly slid towards Marshall and clung to his sides. "NO WAY!" he yelled in his face. "OF COURSE I DON'T! I'VE NEVER ONCE THOUGHT LIKE THAT ABOUT YOU OR ANYONE!"

Marshall jumped. "Whoa, Chase! Easy! Calm down! Deep breaths!"

Marshall quickly moved to put his arms around Chase, noticing that his breathing had quickened considerably. He started to feel guilty. It was clear as day to him that he'd just pressed all the wrong buttons. If the dalmatian needed any more decisive evidence that how the others viewed Chase was an issue close to the shepherd's heart, then he'd just got it. But right now, priority number one was calming Chase down. Marshall hugged the shepherd tightly, rubbing his back for good measure, listening as Chase's breathing slowed back down.

"Shhhhh… It's OK…" Marshall whispered. "It was just a dumb dream..."

"But it… Really hit home…" Chase whispered sadly. "I mean, the last thing I remember of that dream is you running away crying… And me screaming more awful things after you… Like… 'Coward'… and 'Big baby'… and saying that you should just go away..."

Marshall winced at the thought of such vicious words coming from a kind pup like Chase. "Chase, that really isn't you… At all." Marshall replied gently. "Now, like I said, you are pretty bossy and stubborn… and you do yell at us..."

"Thanks. Real encouraging." Chase replied icily.

"Let me finish, Chase." Marshall continued with a degree of force. "But that's all because you care! You care about all of us! You always worry about us! You hate to see us getting hurt, and even if you get too harsh, you always apologize later!"

Chase remained silent with his head turned away from Marshall, his nose buried under the covers.

"Aside from Ryder, you're our leader…" Marshall went on. "We'd be worried if you weren't overprotective… You've been like that the whole time we've been part of the Paw Patrol..."

"I guess…" Chase replied, uncertainty dripping off of his words. "But… Still… I give you a lot of grief, right? Whenever you do something dangerous, I always yell at you a whole lot…"

"What did I just say, Chase? It's because you worry about us."

"I know that!" Chase raised his voice once more. "But I get worried the most about you and Skye! When it comes to danger, you both always get the worst of it!"

Marshall couldn't deny that. They all went through great danger, but putting out fires and flying helicopters were both quite high on the scale. In fact, Chase seemed to make the most fuss over the pair of them more than the others.

"And… we've known each other the longest… You're… like my brother… So this dream made me think… What if one day I end up yelling at you… and I end up crossing the line?" If Marshall could see Chase's face, he'd note that his eyes were screwed shut as his voice began to crack. "What if I end up saying something I can't take back? Maybe one day… I'll end up driving you away by yelling at you… What if one day I yell at you and you never want to talk to me again… Or worse… What if… What if I n-never… never see you again… A-and… it'd be… it'd be all my fault..."

With every word, Chase sounded like he was getting closer and closer to tears, not helped by him shaking more and more with every word. Marshall felt like he'd just been jabbed in the heart. He knew that it was in Chase's nature as a worrywart to read them the riot act if they ever got in trouble, but he never thought that Chase was so self-conscious about it that he could imagine the worst-case scenario playing out like that. Marshall simply embraced Chase tighter still as he racked his brain for responses. Eventually, Marshall steeled himself, and opened his mouth once more.

"Chase…" Marshall began. "Think about it. Let's pretend that did happen. Let's pretend you really did yell at me so badly that I thought we weren't friends anymore. Remember that we share the Lookout with four more pups and Ryder. He's like our dad, really." Marshall cracked a fond smile at all of the times Ryder was there for both of them. "If we got into a big fight like that, everyone would wanna make sure we made up. They're our family, right? They all wouldn't just let us suffer after a fight like that. They'd make sure we got back together in the end."

Chase remained as silent as ever. But he was shaking a little less than before, which Marshall took as a good sign.

"And after that, I'm sure we both will have learned something." Marshall continued. "And then we'll be better friends than ever. I'd never leave you or the Paw Patrol. You know that. And you know me. Whenever we get into a fight, it doesn't matter how bad it is, we always forgive each other eventually, right?"

"...yeah?" Chase shakily replied. Clearly, he still wasn't convinced. But Marshall wasn't done.

"Not that any of that matters. Because I know you'd never say things like that. You wanna know why?" Marshall asked.

"...what… makes you so sure?" Chase countered shakily.

"(Whoa. Deja vu.)" Marshall thought with some amusement, before leaning in and whispering in Chase's ear, not letting up on the tight hug he had Chase in.

"Because you're Chase." Marshall whispered, before pulling back slightly and talking with a little more volume. "You're one of the nicest, bravest and toughest pups I know. You're our big brother… You're MY big brother… Saying all those horrible things isn't you at all. Maybe its some nasty, awful, kitty-eating Chase from another planet or something, but it's NOT. YOU."

Chase smiled slightly at Marshall's odd analogy as he took in every word the dalmatian was saying.

"You look out for all of us." Marshall continued. "You worry about all of us. All you want is to make sure that we're all OK at the end of the day. We get that. We know the real you, and the real you isn't anything like what you were in your dream. The fact that you yelled earlier? I'd say that's proof enough that you'd never say anything like that." Chase still didn't reply as Marshall continued to encourage him.

"In the end: You're hard on us, but we'd never want you to change." Marshall concluded. "You're our Chase. And always will be. Enough said."

There was a pause after that. It was only about ten seconds, but to Marshall, it felt like a lifetime, torturing him with questions of if he said the right thing or not. If he'd only ended up making things worse. But after the ten seconds had passed, Marshall immediately started to internally panic when he heard sniffling and weeping coming from his arms.

"Oh, Chase, it's OK… don't cry..." Marshall tried to soothe the sobbing shepherd.

On hearing this Chase finally looked Marshall in the eye, only to immediately vanquish Marshall's feeling of panic with the look on his face. His eyes were indeed flushed with tears which were running down his cheeks. But above all, Marshall noticed a smile on Chase's face that was so wide it may well split his head in two.

"A-and… And who's fault is that?!" Chase sobbed joyfully. "Y-you've made me so happy, I can't stop!"

"Well, in that case…" Marshall couldn't help but smile back, relief dripping off of his every word. "Go ahead and cry all you want..."

Marshall exhaled deeply with relief as Chase clung to him, sobbing happily the whole while. Those words were exactly what Chase needed to hear. That for as hard as Chase could be on him, Marshall knew perfectly well that Chase loved him to bits and cared deeply for him. As he did with the other pups. And Chase certainly felt far better as he cried into Marshall's fur with the spotted pup embracing him tightly. It had been a long time since Chase had felt so happy, and he, like Marshall had three months back, couldn't express his gratitude with mere words.

Eventually, Chase had stopped crying, his breaths becoming even and tranquil. Slowly, he moved from the hug to look at Marshall. His eyes were red from crying, but the smile on his face hadn't faded, even partially.

"What did I do to deserve a friend like you?" Chase whispered.

"I think I already told you." Marshall returned Chase's smile, licking his nose for good measure and causing Chase to giggle. "And besides, if we couldn't call it even a couple of months ago, we sure can now..."

Chase licked Marshall's face vigorously, an action that made Marshall giggle in return. Chase only stopped when he emitted a big yawn. Marshall found himself recoiling at Chase's dog breath.

"Heh... Looks like... you're ready to... get some sleep, now." Marshall couldn't stop himself from yawning in turn. The fatigue of the night had finally caught up with the pair of them, and they were finally ready to get some much-needed rest.

"Sure am…" Chase mumbled. "Are you?"

"Yeah… Forgot how tiring talking about bad dreams was…" Marshall found himself snuggling into Chase's fur. "And how soft you were..."

"Heh… Look who's… talking..." Chase replied.

The pups finally had it in them to go back to sleep. Marshall was tired to begin with, but knowing that Chase's nightmare could finally stop haunting him, and Chase knowing that viciousness like that was simply not in the cards for him comforted the pair of them enough to be able to get some rest. The pair's teddies may have been pushed to one side, but Chase was still able to use one of his paws to reach over and press the button located in Officer Bear's nose.

As much as the soft lullaby soothed the pair of them and as much as they struggled to stay awake, Marshall couldn't help but voice confusion.

"Chase?" Marshall slurred. "Aren't you… aren't you gonna… bring in… Officer Bear?"

"Nah…" Chase sleepily replied. "I… I don't need that… old teddy..."

Chase punctuated his response with a loving nuzzle. "I've got a better one."

Marshall briefly froze, before responding in kind, nuzzling Chase as vigorously as he could and further tightening his hug. But just before falling asleep in each other's arms, the two were able to drowsily whisper to each other.

"Love you, Marshall..."

"Love you too, Chase..."

* * *

_**I LIVE.**_

_**First of all, I'm very sorry for keeping anyone waiting like this. I've had my one-shot collection kicking around since shortly after I finished Bulldog in a Bind, but for a plethora of reasons, I've only finished them recently. Life, mostly. Times have been... stressful for me lately, and as you may imagine, that doesn't leave a great deal of time for writing. Especially not seven separate stories all in one go. Anthology writing: NOT. EVEN. ONCE. Now don't worry, I'll let all my complaints out in the afterword I plan to write.**_

_**The next thing I feel the need to tell you about is my schedule for this time: One new story will be uploaded to this collection every Wednesday and Sunday, and it'll consist of a heavier story on Wednesday, followed by a more light, fluffy one on Sunday. That should bring the upload schedule up to mid-May. I previously said that the schedule would be more frequent than this. I understand that I'm going back on my word for that one, and to that end, I'm very sorry. But I feel like this is a good way of stretching out the uploads over a decent pace. Otherwise, I feel like I'd be uploading them too close together. This collection will consist of a series of one-shots between my two favourite characters on this show, and it will show off the friendly relationship the two have (Sorry, shippers. No romance here). Hurt/Comfort is listed as a theme because that's the most common one in this collection.**_

_**And one more thing: I've said in the past that this would possibly be the last thing I wrote. Well... once again, I find myself going back on my word. I still have it in me, but I'll wait until the afterword to fill you all in...**_

_**Now... anything else...? Oh, right, Return to Fear.**_

_**I still feel to this day like Primary Fears is the best thing I've written to date on this site, and I also got another idea that I could've added to it. But I wouldn't want to upload an entire fic about it, so to that end, I chose to write a new one-shot about it. This time with Chase being on the receiving end of the comforting, and Marshall being on the giving end. I can't imagine that this would be as good as Primary Fears itself, but hey, I still felt like continuing it somehow.**_

_**One final note: The cover of this fic was, once again, made for me by the wonderful Zojak. Thank you!**_

_**And now, I'll leave you with a preview of my next one-shot, due to be uploaded Sunday. This will be one of the more lighthearted ones of the group, and- Sweet mother of monkey milk, I've been rambling. I'd better stop here. Thanks for listening (if you haven't tuned out from my blather), and I hope to see you Sunday for next time.**_

* * *

**_MINDING THE MEDIC_**

**Marshall has always been seen as the go-to pup for illness and injury in Adventure Bay. Ever since his training as an EMT, his medical knowledge has proven invaluable many a time. But when Marshall himself is taken out of action by an illness and with Katie and the vet unavailable, one of the pups will have to step out of their comfort zone to find out what is wrong.  
**


	2. Minding the Medic

**_MINDING THE MEDIC_**

**Marshall has always been seen as the go-to pup for illness and injury in Adventure Bay. Ever since his training as an EMT, his medical knowledge has proven invaluable many a time. But when Marshall himself is taken out of action by an illness and with Katie and the vet unavailable, one of the pups will have to step out of their comfort zone to find out what is wrong.**

* * *

If there was one sight the Paw Patrol could count on to wake up to in the morning, it was the face of their leader gently shaking them awake. Chase was always an early-bird, fitting for perhaps the most duty-driven of the pups, and he always greeted his friends in the morning by waking them one by one. However, he'd always save Marshall for last. He was among one of the heaviest sleepers on the team, and he usually took the longest waking his clumsy, golden-hearted friend. And today looked to be no exception, as Chase tried to shake the spotted pup awake.

"Hey, Marshall. Marshall! Come on! Wake up!" Chase gently ordered. He wondered if Marshall had gotten enough sleep last night. It was taking slightly longer than usual to wake the dalmatian.

"U-uuuugggghhh… Urrrgh… Urk..."

Chase soon found himself getting his answer. Strangely, Marshall hadn't opened his eyes, or even moved. Instead, all he did was groan.

"Huh? Marshall?" Chase asked with concern. "Something up?"

"Argh…" Marshall's eyes opened very slowly, but upon registering Chase's presence, Marshall bolted backwards. "Ah- G-get back, Chase! Don't come… any… ugh..."

Marshall had groggily fallen back down onto the floor with an expression of pain, punctuating his fall with a few coughs. He looked far less exuberant than he usually did. His voice sounded nasal and scratchy, as if his nose was blocked up.

"Wh-what's wrong?" Chase started to grow worried. "Are you feeling OK?

"...no..." Marshall moaned hoarsely.

"Jeez, you sound really sick… What's going on?" Chase started to slowly approach Marshall.

"Ah, Chase! D-don't… don't come any closer!" Marshall shuffled backwards once more. "I… I don't want… you to… get… si-urgh..." He didn't get to complete his sentence as he curled up on the spot, feeling a sudden stab of pain in his stomach.

"Well, excuse me for being worried." Chase sassily retorted.

Chase moved in close to Marshall and laid a paw on the pup's white forehead, only to quickly yank it back with an expression of pain.

"Agh! Jeez, Marshall, you're burning up!" Chase yelped.

This wasn't looking good. Despite Marshall's forehead being hot enough to scorch the shepherd's paw, the dalmatian was shivering where he lay. It was clear as day that Marshall was feeling sick. And something told Chase that this wasn't just a garden variety cold. Chase internally panicked. Usually, Marshall was the first port of call for when one of them was unwell, but not once had any of them considered what might happen if their EMT was out of action.

"I'll call Ryder." Chase decided. "Just, y'know… Don't move."

"...ha." Marshall responded mirthlessly. Chase called for their leader on his Pup Tag. It took a few seconds, but eventually, Ryder answered.

"Hi, Chase." Ryder greeted cheerfully. "Everything OK?"

"No." Chase immediately replied. "Well, Marshall sure isn't. He looks really sick."

Chase could practically hear Ryder's sunny demeanour falter. "'Sick'? Uh-oh. How sick are we talking?"

"He's burning up. And it sounds like he can barely breathe or even talk."

"Oh, no…" Ryder mumbled, with worry clearly setting in for the boy. "Hold on, I'm coming!"

Chase had opened his mouth to answer, but found himself being interrupted by a loud retching noise. Turning his attention back to Marshall, he'd noticed that the spotted pup had gone wide-eyed. Chase barely had time to flatten himself against the wall of the Pup House as Marshall immediately shot out like a streak of white lightning.

"WHOA-!" Chase yelled. "You might wanna hurry! It looks Marshall's gonna-"

Chase couldn't complete his sentence, as Marshall essentially finished it for him. Sympathy and revulsion paralysed the shepherd as Marshall loudly emptied his stomach onto the floor, causing a horrendous splattering to echo around the Lookout.

"...puke..."

There was no denying it. Rather fittingly, Marshall was as sick as a dog. Not that the other pups needed to be told that. Marshall vomiting like a fire hose had inevitably caught their attention, and when they came to investigate, it took everything in their power to stop them from joining in. It was worse for Rubble, who was tasked with finding sand to throw over the pool of vomit. As if the day needed to be made any more surreal for the pups, Rubble was disgusted enough to decline breakfast altogether.

Ryder had placed Marshall in a dark red pet bed in the Lookout, while also giving the pup his teddy and draping a flame-patterned blanket over him, setting a bowl of water nearby, along with a pail in case he had to throw up again. As grateful as he was, Marshall looked and felt absolutely miserable. His head hurt, his body ached, his throat was burning, his stomach was bubbling like a volcano and his nose was completely blocked. As if to punctuate how he felt, Marshall struggled to sniff before coughing roughly. The pups and Ryder stood at the other side of the Lookout as Ryder briefed them on what was going on.

"Well, pups." Ryder began. "It looks like you'll have to stay away from Marshall for a little while."

"What's he got, anyway?" Rubble asked.

"I don't know." Ryder replied. "But we know it's more than just a puppy cold."

"Where the heck could he have got something like that?" Zuma added, looking perplexed. "No-one in Adventuwe Bay's that sick, wight?"

"Barkingburg, maybe?" Rocky suggested. "Remember that we had to watch over the parade a week ago. Remember how many people were there?"

"Oh, yeah…" Skye realised, remembering that a gathering of that many people would more or less be a giant petri dish. "All kinds of people were there. Sweetie, too."

"Well, of course." Chase dryly replied. "Anyway, can't we take Marshall to Katie? Maybe she'd know?"

Ryder's haggard-looking face turned to one of annoyance. "That was my first thought, but er, heh heh…" he chuckled humourlessly. "She's out of town and won't be back for another week..."

The pups emitted a collective groan of annoyance. "Great. Just great." Chase spat. "Because the only other one who can figure what's wrong with Marshall is Marshall himself. And that pup's not in much of a condition to work!"

"I guess we'll have to take him to the vet, right?" Skye asked.

Ryder sighed heftily. "I wish it was that simple. He's been really busy lately. If he can fit Marshall in, it probably won't be for another couple of days."

Now the annoyance had turned to worry. The pups whined at the realisation that their options had very quickly dried up at the worst time. Everyone started to turn their minds to how they could find out exactly what was wrong with Marshall and how they could take care of him, but as much as they struggled, nobody could come up with anything. Marshall however, for his part, already had an idea, and he wasn't about to let an illness silence him.

"Guys..." Marshall scratchily whispered as loudly as he could. He didn't want to admit how much strength it took just to do that.

"Marshall?" Chase asked, whipping around to look at him with the other pups. "You shouldn't be talking! You need to rest your throat!"

"If… one of you… could get my… EMT… pack… I could… show you… what you need… to do." Marshall strained to finish his sentence.

"No way, Marshall!" Ryder immediately shot back in concern. "The last thing you need right now is work! We'll think of something!"

"You… don't have a choice… I can diagnose… myself… no problem. It'll be… way quicker..."

"But Mawshall, even if we did that, none of us know what we're doing!" Zuma complained. "You'we the EMT hewe, not us!"

"I'll… teach you… Sorry, but… my mind's made up…" Marshall had put his foot down. "Sick or not, I'm… doing this..."

"(Ugh, stubborn pup...)" Chase thought resignedly with a sigh.

When Marshall set his mind to something, changing it was nigh-impossible. Not even illness and injury could convince him to give up on a job. Chase frequently received complaints of being stubborn, but if there was another pup that complaint could be directed at, it was Marshall.

"I'll do it." Chase declared, much to everyone else's shock.

"Huh? Chase?" Rubble asked as everyone whipped around to look at the shepherd.

"That pup's looked after me when I've gotten sick before. Time to pay the piper."

"But, Chase, Marshall looks after all of us when we get sick!" Rocky retorted.

"All the more reason we need to pay him back, right?" Chase replied. "Besides, you know me, I like learning new things."

"But if you get close to Marshall then… you might get sick." Skye posited worriedly.

"Too late for that. I already touched his forehead." Chase said with a shrug. "But if me getting sick means we find out what's wrong with Marshall, then that's just how it is."

"But what if you get taken out too, dude? I'm not suwe we could take on wescues with you both gone." Zuma added.

Chase opened his mouth to reply, but as much as he was loathe to admit it, he couldn't counter the labrador's point. Particularly in the case of a big rescue, it was always himself and Marshall. One pup they might be able to cover for the absence of, but two? That would very likely be a strain on their resources. Still, Chase gave a defiant look to Zuma, and directed that same look to Ryder, who was listening intently, attempting to make up his mind as to whether to grant Chase's request or not.

"Chase, I..." Ryder began, before being cut off by the timely bleeping of his Pup Pad, prompting the boy to let off a quiet, irritated snarl at being unable to give his say in the matter.

"Guess I win." Chase remarked with a shrug.

Ryder took a little while to give an answer. "...do what you have to. We'll talk about this later. And BE. CAREFUL." he commanded sternly, clearly unhappy at being unable to even monitor the situation.

"Don't worry about me, Ryder, sir." Chase replied with a confident smirk. "I got this."

Before Ryder answered his Pup Pad, Chase ran to the elevator and had ascended out of sight. Marshall listened for a little while before trying to rest his eyes. Humdinger's kittens were apparently causing trouble around Adventure Bay again. It was probably going to be more of a trial without their police pup, but at least Chase's allergies weren't going to cause him too much trouble.

Marshall eventually opened his eyes again when he heard another noise. This time the door had opened to reveal Chase walking towards him dressed in Marshall's EMT cap, Pup Pack and slightly-undersized red vest.

"Hey, check it out, Marshall!" Chase declared. "Doctor Chase is on the case!"

"Ha ha ha ha ha…" Marshall chuckled weakly. "You… you look good in red, actually..."

Chase gave a warm smile, happy that he was at least able to bring some light back to his sick and miserable friend.

"Well, your gear is a little tight in the chest… But there'll be time to do my turn on the pupwalk later. The sooner we can figure out what's wrong with you, the sooner you can go back to sleep."

"I'll… try..." Marshall groaned, giving another futile, blocked-up sniff.

"Just stay with me, Marshall. It'll all work out. What should I do first?"

"Well… I always start with someone's temperature. Just put the thermometer… in my mouth for a few seconds."

"Right. Ruff! Thermometer!"

At Chase's command, an arm sprang forth from the Pack holding a small, glass thermometer. Chase walked closer to the ailing pup, the arm moving closer to Marshall's mouth.

"Open wide." Chase instructed.

"Aaaaaah."

Marshall bit down on the thermometer that had been inserted into his mouth. And after about five seconds, he looked at the expectant Chase and nodded, prompting the shepherd to retract the arm and bring the thermometer close to his eyes. The shepherd squinted at where the red line stopped, before his eyes shot back open in fright.

"...whoa! 104!" Chase yelled. "That's… er, that's bad, right?" Chase deflated partway through when he realised he didn't actually know what he was saying.

"Whoa…" Marshall groaned. "Yep, that's a temperature… I thought it was flu to start with… and this isn't changing my mind..."

Chase's stomach dropped. "Flu? Oh, no. What do we do for that?"

"One thing at a time, Chase… Next would be the X-ray screen."

Chase shook off his worry for the time being. "Yeah?"

"Normally I'd… use it to check for… broken bones… but it has a muscle scanner, too… Might show me… why I'm so achey..."

"OK… Ruff! X-ray screen!" Chase barked out his tool of choice, and Marshall's screen extended forth, switching on to show the dalmatian's skeleton.

"Muscle scanner!" Chase commanded.

The screen changed before Chase's eyes. Now instead of a skeleton, an incomprehensible mass of glowing shapes filled in the Marshall-shaped outline on the screen. Some glowed green, but Chase couldn't help but notice the pink and red blotches in various places. Chase shifted back and forth to get a better view of Marshall's various muscles.

"OK, I have no idea what I'm looking at, here…" Chase conceded. "Some of these are… pink?"

"What's pink exactly?" Marshall asked dizzily, his body starting to give out.

"Well, the top of your back, your back legs and your head…" Chase half-mumbled, leering at the screen. "The front of your neck's a little pink, too..."

"Oh yeah, those ache… Those pink parts are where something's wrong… And my throat's sore, so that explains my neck..." Marshall explained. "Anything else?"

"You'll have to tell me. There's something near your nose that's totally red..."

"Closed up, probably..." Marshall sniffed and coughed.

"And your stomach is red, too."

"Nausea..."

To Marshall, all of the warning signs were there. Now he was certain that he'd picked up flu. Worse is that his body was starting to run on fumes. He laid his head down and squeezed his teddy as he struggled to stay conscious.

"So, Marshall. What do you think?" Chase asked as the screen returned to the red Pup Pack.

"...urrrgh..." Marshall groaned heavily.

"Marshall? C'mon, pal, stay with me!"

"...ugh… So… tired..."

"Don't fall asleep yet! I still need to know what to do!"

Marshall grumbled. "...you've done… most of the work… It's gotta be… flu..."

"How do you know?"

"Fatigue… Sore throat… High temperature… Muscle aches… Can't breathe… And nausea on the side… All flu symptoms..."

"There's gotta be medicine for it… right?"

Chase asked a question, but Marshall didn't answer it. He'd curled up tightly, only to emit a soft, if audible retch. In a flash, Marshall shot over to the pail close to his bed, flinging the blanket off of himself. He leaned over the pail and once again, started to vomit.

"Oh, no! Ewwwwwwww! Urgh..." Chase cried out as Marshall ran to the pail, before sympathetically cringing in disgust again as he was forced to listen to Marshall voiding his stomach for the second time.

After the second lot of unpleasantness that day, Chase had helped his friend wobble back to bed, and tucked him in once more. Chase had pushed the water bowl over to Marshall to allow him to take a drink to wash the taste of vomit from his mouth. Soon, Marshall lay listlessly in the bed once more.

"You OK?" Chase asked. "Well, I mean, I guess not, but..."

"...the only medicine that'll help right now… is that… stomach medicine I give everyone when they get… sick..." Marshall groaned hoarsely, apparently trying to shrug off his recent vomiting fit.

"That slop, huh?" Chase asked with a note of sympathy. "Guess now you'll know how it feels."

"Nah, I've… medicated myself before… but that doesn't make it… taste any better." Marshall cringed at the thought of having to settle his own stomach with his disgusting medicine. "Look in my ambulance for… Pepictate… That's what I give you..."

"Prepare your tastebuds, Marshall. This won't be pretty..."

Chase had run out of the door to Marshall's Pup House. If there was one thing that could be said about Marshall's medicine, it's that it was beyond disgusting. Every time he had to administer anything to any of the pups, he ended up reducing them to retching, spluttering wrecks, with Rubble even describing the taste as similar to the stinkiest garbage around. Marshall sorely regretted the day when he first had to self-medicate when he found himself with a stubborn cough. Still, no-one could deny that it worked. But before Marshall could reflect further on the nature of his vile medicine, Chase returned with a bottle filled with a thick, pale pink liquid.

"Found it." Chase said, setting the bottle on the ground.

"...OK… well…" Marshall groaned hesitantly. "...take out the syringe… fill it up and… then push it into my mouth…"

"Ruff! Syringe!"

Chase decided not to waste any time as the syringe came forth, along with a second arm that uncapped the bottle, releasing a pungent smell of chemicals. The second arm moved aside, allowing the arm with the syringe to place it into the bottle.

"Plunger up!"

At Chase's command, the plunger of the syringe moved up, slowly filling the container with the thick liquid. As it finished filling, Marshall cringed. He tried to brace his tastebuds, but he knew that no amount of prep would save him from the awful taste. The second arm on the red Pup Pack recapped the bottle, and Chase moved towards Marshall, the syringe moving close to the dalmatian's mouth.

"Here it comes." Chase warned. Despite this, Marshall kept his mouth firmly closed.

"C'mon, Marshall." Chase added firmly. "Don't be a baby, now."

Marshall sighed. "Ulp… Ahhh..." Slowly, regretfully, Marshall opened his mouth again, closing it as Chase moved the syringe into his mouth.

"Plunger down."

"Gmph… Mmph, ulp… Ulp…"

With his eyes squeezed shut, Marshall tried to swallow back the repulsive liquid as quickly as he could, but it didn't seem to matter. It just kept on coming, flooding his mouth over and over. It felt like an eternity to the dalmatian. Eventually, the liquid stopped coming, and Chase removed the syringe from Marshall's mouth.

Mmph! Gh- Khahck! BLEEEEEEEEEECCCCCHHHH!" Marshall screeched, shaking his head around and diving for his water bowl, lapping like his life depended on it.

"Urgh, it never gets any easier!" Marshall growled after catching his breath from frantically lapping up water, barely noticing Chase giggling at Marshall's reaction.

"What? Taking it or giving it?"

"Yes."

That one word was all it took for Chase to burst out laughing. His reaction to the medicine was funny enough, but even when sick, Marshall still had a degree of sass to him. The syringe reentered the Pup Pack as Chase's laughter slowed down.

"Sorry, but that was kinda funny…" Chase sighed, moving a paw to his eye to wipe away a tear. "Plus, we're not on the receiving end of your gross medicine, for once!"

No reply. Marshall had returned to the bed and laid down under the blanket, still holding his teddy.

"So, uhh… We done here?" Chase asked, moving around to look Marshall in the eye. But when Chase got to look Marshall in the face, he saw that Marshall had finally given out, lying fast asleep in the bed.

"I'll take that as a yes." Chase quietly conceded. "Get some of your strength back, Marshall. I'll be back later."

Chase had decided to leave Marshall to sleep for a while. He sorely needed it, after all. He took the bottle of medication in his mouth once more, and headed for the door. Though as he walked outside, he saw the pups returning from their most recent mission, with Zuma leading the pack driving Chase's truck. The sight made Chase grin, thanks to his vest hanging shabbily off of Zuma's smaller frame and his hat drifting over the labrador's eyes. As Zuma turned off to park the truck, he caught sight of the shepherd in red.

"Hey, Chase! Nice outfit!"

"Same to you!"

A couple of hours later, Marshall was hearing voices. He wondered if he was just having a fever dream, but then he realised that he was actually awake, as he strained to open one of his eyes slightly. The first thing he saw was the pups all standing together a short distance from his bed, with Ryder stood behind them, and Chase still wearing Marshall's EMT gear. None of them had seemed to notice him waking up, as they were all looking at one another, deep in conversation.

"He doesn't look any different..." Rubble said.

"Rubble, you don't get over the flu in a couple of hours. You know that." Chase replied.

"I just don't want him to get worse..." Rubble said sadly.

"He just needs west, wight?" Zuma asked.

"And to drink a lot of water." Rocky added.

"And to not spread my germs..." Marshall croaked. Everyone quickly turned their attention to him upon hearing his voice.

"Marshall? You feeling OK?" Skye asked gently.

"...well, no…" Marshall replied hoarsely.

"But are you any better?"

"...urgh..."

"Pups, I think Marshall needs to be alone with Chase for a while. I'll catch up later." Ryder instructed. The pups all looked towards him, nodded, and took their leave once more.

To the best of his ability, Marshall let out a sad whine when he was sure the pups had all left. Sympathetically, Ryder kneeled down in front of the bed and scooped Marshall into his arms, keeping him bundled up in the blanket and holding him close, rubbing the back of the pup's head.

"Oh, Marshall…" Ryder whispered with a hint of guilt. "I'm sorry I haven't been around, lately..."

"I… hate this…" Marshall whined. "Ryder… I… feel terrible..."

"You're one sick pup, huh? I called the vet earlier, but you'll have to hang in there until the day after tomorrow."

Both Chase and Ryder hated to see one of the pups so sick. It was worse that they had to wait for him to be properly looked at. Chase could only whine sadly.

"I'm sorry if I haven't done a good job, Marshall..." Chase whimpered. Hearing Chase's apology caused Marshall to turn in his direction, while not taking his head off of Ryder's chest.

"What are you… talking about?" Marshall croaked. "Chase, for a first time… that was… pretty good..."

"Yeah, only because I had you watching out for me."

"But you still handled my Pup Pack like a natural… You know, you'd make a pretty good EMT..."

Chase perked up in response. "You… think so?" he asked, amazed.

"Yeah, maybe… if you got some training, then… you could be our backup EMT..."

A backup EMT would definitely be useful, considering that theirs just ended up taken out. And to Marshall, Chase proved nicely that he had what it takes. The shepherd was touched. Despite his own doubts, he'd done very well in Marshall's eyes.

"...Marshall… thank you…" Chase whispered, a big smile creeping across this face. "That means a lot coming from you."

"...Ryder?" Marshall asked, looking up at the boy.

"I'll think about it." Ryder replied thoughtfully. He had to admit, the idea had merit. "Looks like you had a pretty good teacher, huh, Chase?"

"Yep!" Chase replied, more cheerfully than he had in a long while. "I'm amazed Marshall managed it with the flu!"

"You both did great work today!" Ryder praised the pair. "You're both such good pups!"

From that moment on, things had started improving. Marshall's condition hadn't improved any in three days, but perhaps hearteningly, it hadn't worsened either. Marshall frequently complained of being bored, but then being stuck in bed wasn't exactly good for a young dalmatian anyway. But the other pups did what they could to make sure Marshall's spirits stayed up, from watching TV with him, to telling stories of their rescues, and even going through some photo albums with him. And Chase and Ryder, for their parts, did their best to make sure Marshall was comfortable and checked him over frequently. If there was one thing that Marshall could be happy about, it was having such good friends. Though he could've done without Chase's repeated doses of disgusting medicine.

The vet had basically confirmed Marshall and Chase's combined diagnosis of flu. He gave the group some pills for Marshall to take to help ward off the symptoms, but warned that Marshall would need some more time in bed, much to the dalmatian's chagrin. But it only took a couple more days for Marshall to start feeling slightly better, even if he was told to stay in bed. But as the fifth day of Marshall's illness had dawned, he woke up to see something out of the ordinary. An extra, dark blue pet bed had been set up next to him, occupied by a listless-looking german shepherd with a star-patterned blanket draped over him, clutching Officer Bear close to him.

"Chase?" Marshall mumbled.

Chase stirred in bed, slowly craning his head towards the dalmatian. "...how's it hanging, Marshall?" he croaked with a rueful smile.

"Oh, no… not you too..."

"Yep… me too…"

Marshall groaned. He knew this would happen from the moment Chase started taking care of him.

"Had a feeling… this might happen..." Marshall groaned.

"So did I…" Chase whispered hoarsely. "...but it was worth it..."

Even when he ran the risk of getting sick, even when he'd been warned of the risks, Chase would still walk over hot coals for his friends. Marshall smiled widely as a single thought ran through his head.

"(Stubborn pup...)"

* * *

_**And here we have one of the lighter fics out of the way in this collection. It's funny, I've wanted to write a sick fic about Marshall for quite a while, but I was hung up on what illness to give him. I was initially thinking a generic stomach virus, until I returned from the trip I took abroad with something similar to the flu and decided "Right, that's what I'm giving him". Let me tell you, it wasn't pretty. Plus, it would be an interesting opportunity for Marshall to coach a pup stepping out of their comfort zone.**_

_**Anyway, next fic is back to the heavy territory. I feel like they REALLY start getting good from this point onwards. Without further ado, thanks for listening, and here's the description for you.**_

* * *

**_BOILING OVER_**

**Marshall has long been known for his ability to take misfortune in his stride. But even he has his limits, and one particularly bad day causes him to lash out in spectacular fashion after being pushed beyond those limits. Now Chase has to to not only find the straw that broke the pup's back, but help to repair Marshall's crushed spirits.  
**


	3. Boiling Over

**_BOILING OVER_**

**Marshall has long been known for his ability to take misfortune in his stride. But even he has his limits, and one particularly bad day causes him to lash out in spectacular fashion after being pushed beyond those limits. Now Chase has to to not only find the straw that broke the pup's back, but help to repair Marshall's crushed spirits.**

* * *

It was hard to get a pup like Marshall down. Even for all of his faults, he rarely stayed down for long. Some days, he'd end up falling over himself, or hitting the wrong target with his water cannons, but he was one to not repeat his mistakes. No matter what pushed him down, he'd always end up back on all fours at the end of it.

Today, however, seemed to be intent on making sure he stayed down. At this point, "comedy of errors" would make for a good descriptor of his day. From accidentally hitting Rocky with his water cannons twice, to getting their ball stuck in a tree, to accidentally tripping Mayor Goodway, to causing Farmer Al to drop what he was carrying, to countless other mistakes, just about everything that could go wrong was going wrong for the clumsy dalmatian. But despite this, he strained to keep himself smiling and upbeat. Everyone had said that they forgave him for his mistakes and that what he'd done was only an accident. But the more errors he made, the more their forgiveness had started to ring hollow.

Marshall was a pup stretched thin on that day. But now he was about to break. An upcoming art competition had caused the pups to start gathering paint, brushes and a large canvas together to put a picture together, with Marshall needing to stand by with his cannons. Marshall had vowed to himself that he wouldn't make another mistake. But the pups had barely gotten started before Marshall slipped on one of the brushes and found himself uncontrollably rolling a can of orange paint towards the canvas.

"Whoawhoawhoawhoa!" Marshall yelled.

"WATCH OUT!" Zuma cried.

"Nonononononononono!" As he rolled, Marshall knew what was going to come of it, despite his best efforts to stop the can.

"Marshall, no!" Skye called out.

But it was all too late. Marshall had finally lost his footing and sent the paint can crashing into an open can of yellow paint, sending it flying and splattering its contents all over the canvas, completely ruining it. The pups all cringed as Marshall fell off, and cringed further when the can impacted the canvas.

"Awww, no! Ugh, what a mess!" Rubble groaned.

Marshall finally had all he could take. When the impact of his most recent blunder had hit him, something inside of him snapped. The pot had boiled over despite his best efforts to put a lid on it.

"No… No, no, no, no, NO! NO! NO!" Marshall screamed, ripping his helmet off of his head and slapping it across the ground in total rage. "Another screw-up to add to the pile! Why can't I do anything right?!" Marshall puncutated each sentence by furiously stomping his paws on the ground. "EVERY SINGLE TIME I DO ANYTHING IT GOES WRONG! WHY AM I SUCH A FAILURE?!"

The pups froze up in horror at this sudden explosion from Marshall. Of all the pups to get angry, Marshall was one of the last ones that they had thought of. But here he was erupting in a display of volcanic ire.

"Whoa, Marshall! Where did this come from?!" Chase yelled back in shock. "It was an acc-"

"SHUT IT, COP BOY!" Marshall roared. This sudden display of hostility was so cold it caused Chase to freeze on the spot, staring on in fear.

"You don't have any idea! None of you do!" Marshall continued, small beads of rage-filled tears forming in his eyes. "I know what you all think! Why did Ryder choose such a stupid klutz as the fire pup?! I'M TRYING, BUT NONE OF IT MATTERS! DON'T BOTHER WITH YOUR PITY, 'CAUSE I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT!"

Angrily detatching his Pup Pack, Marshall whipped around and charged off towards his Pup House. The remaining pups could only watch, trying to get what they just saw and heard through their heads. Some had their mouths hanging open. Some tried to get a read on the others, wondering if they'd just seen the same terrifying display as they had. But Chase in particular, as much as he prided himself on being a professional, couldn't quite handle such a vicious retort from a close friend. He soon felt his lip quivering.

"...Wh… Wh-wha… What did I say…?" Chase stammered, trying to stem the tears threatening to run down his face.

When everyone had found the resolve to move again, one of the first places Chase went was Ryder's room. He had to share what happened with someone. Anyone. But with the risk of a breakdown looming over him, he only felt confident in seeing their owner, who realised something was up near-immediately when he saw the look of frightened sadness on his pup's face. After an effort to calm Chase down, Ryder listened carefully as Chase recounted what happened.

"He just… blew up?" Ryder asked.

"Totally…" Chase replied mournfully. "I… I said something wrong, didn't I?"

"It doesn't sound like it, Chase. But then, that doesn't sound like Marshall, either."

"But it happened! I swear!" Chase looked up, obviously distressed. "I don't know what the heck's going on!"

"Well, you're our detective pup, right? You can find out, can't you? He probably feels awful about yelling at you. It makes sense that you'd be the one to go make things right with him."

Ryder knew Marshall well. That pup couldn't handle the weight of the world. Nobody could. And he'd already put together that Marshall had been pushed past his limits. And that once Marshall calmed down, he'd feel terrible.

"But… What if Marshall hates me?"

"Don't be ridiculous, Chase." Ryder replied with a small smile. "That's totally impossible. The idea of Marshall hating anyone is just silly. You know that. In fact, if you want my two cents, it sounds like Marshall's stressed out. Like what happened with that paint was the final straw for him. Whenever he falls down, he always gets back up, but there's only so much one pup can take."

Chase blinked. "You… think so?"

"Maybe." Ryder lied. He didn't think so. He knew so. "I'm just throwing stuff out there, but maybe it'll give you some ideas."

"Are you… sure I can make Marshall feel better? Are you sure I can find out what's wrong with him?"

Ryder kneeled down and placed a hand on Chase's head. "You can do it, Chase." Ryder whispered reassuringly. "I know you can. If there's one pup who can pick Marshall back up, it's you."

Ryder's encouragement had helped Chase find the confidence to face Mt. Marshall. He gave it a few minutes before his anxiety took him over and he steeled himself for a heart-to-heart chat with his friend. Whatever it was that was affecting him, Chase was going to find out. Sure enough, when he arrived at the red Pup House, he saw Marshall with his back turned to him, completely immobile. Chase couldn't help but wince at the small, paw-shaped dents in the walls. And if he knew Marshall, then he'd likely been crying, too. Chase took a couple of deep breaths, hoping that Marshall hadn't realised he was there yet, before opening his mouth.

"Marshall? You feeling OK?" Chase asked gently.

"...go away, Chase..." Marshall replied miserably after a few seconds, without moving from his spot.

Chase wasn't going to be gotten rid of that easily. "Not a chance."

"Look, if you want an apology, then I'm sorry I screamed at you! Just leave me alone, OK?!" Marshall continued to avoid looking at the shepherd.

"Sorry, pal." Chase's gentle tone didn't falter. "It's gonna take way more than that to get rid of me right now."

Finally, Marshall rose to his feet and whipped around. Chase's suspicions were confirmed when he saw Marshall's red, puffy eyes stare back at him, locked in a glare.

"What do you want from me, then?! You want me to beg?! You want to beat me up?! You want me to disappear?! WHAT?!"

Chase couldn't quite believe what he was hearing. "Marshall, I don't want apologies." Chase's tone turned slightly firmer. "Listen to yourself. What brought all this on?"

"Quit playing dumb, will you?! What DIDN'T bring all this on?! You know what's happening!"

Chase grew slightly annoyed. He felt some of his episode of irrational anger being put into perspective. "No, Marshall, I don't. Please. Whatever's causing this, you can tell me. I'm your friend, aren't I?"

"Yeah, somehow." Marshall replied bitterly. "But you don't deserve me! You don't deserve a pup that screws up all the time! Nothing ever goes right for me! I'm a total jinx!"

Chase realised that words alone weren't going to calm Marshall down after he was this far-gone. But he knew that the familiar, clumsy, silly Marshall of old was still in there. Chase sighed, before taking a deep breath in, and started to slowly and disarmingly walk towards the ranting dalmatian.

"Everything I go near goes bad! I'm so clumsy that I can't even walk a couple of steps without making a total mess of things! Right now, I don't even know why I'm here! All I do is make more work for all of you! I'm a complete fai-"

The words died in Marshall's throat when Chase had finally reached him, sat down in front of him and threw his front paws around him in a warm, reassuring hug. In that moment, Marshall went from distressed and angry to silent and flabbergasted. His jaw hung open and his eyes went wide.

"Calm down, OK…?" Chase whispered. "Just take some deep breaths… Relax..."

The process was slow, but visible. First, Chase felt Marshall fall to his rear. Then, he started to feel him shaking. As the time rolled on, the shaking grew more and more intense. Until finally, Marshall pulled himself closer to Chase and hugged him back with a noticeable level of desperation. It was a slight relief to Chase. The old, angry, resentful Marshall had been banished by the reassuring warmth of Chase's loving embrace. And in his place was a deeply-regretful, depressed Marshall who continued to shake like a leaf. Now Chase could get through to him.

"Shhhh…" Chase whispered. "Don't worry… Everything's going to be fine..."

"Chase, I…" Marshall stammered, his voice cracking. "I-I… I'm so sorry..."

"Hey, I'm more worried than mad…" Chase whispered back, running his paw down Marshall's back. "You obviously didn't mean what you said..."

Marshall sniffled, doing his best to suppress his tears. "...how could you still want to be friends with me?! I screwed up again and screamed at you for it!"

"Marshall..." Chase whispered sadly.

"I just… don't… understand..."

"Because you're not thinking straight… Whatever happened today's messed with your head."

"What, more than usual?" Marshall asked bitterly.

"Hey." Chase took a slightly-firmer tone. "From now on, no more putting yourself down. How about you tell me what happened today?"

"Try 'everything'… I couldn't do one thing right today..."

"I'm listening." Chase replied reassuringly.

Marshall was struggling not to burst into tears and a mess of babbled apologies towards Chase for messing up and yelling at him and the other pups, but Chase managed to keep him relatively calm while Marshall poured his heart out, listing off every single mistake he'd made that day, punctuating each one with self-deprecating insults. As much as Chase wanted to cut him off and tell him how wrong he was about himself, he listened in silence until Marshall had finally finished.

"So what you're saying is that it was all a bad day?" Chase asked, still trying to process what he'd just been told.

"It was… worse than 'bad'…" Marshall replied sadly, still clinging to Chase for dear life. "I'm kinda amazed I wasn't struck by lightning… Which I wouldn't mind right now."

"Oh, Marshall…" Chase whispered sympathetically, with a touch of guilt. "We all have bad days, you know… You should've told us… Heck, I should've noticed you were feeling so down."

"I tried… I really tried to stay positive..."

"And look how that turned out. You bottled it all up until you couldn't take it anymore." Chase whispered with a hint of disappointment. The shepherd was fully familiar with trying to keep his own feelings hidden. It took a meltdown and one of Ryder's lectures for him to fully realise how bad for you the practice was.

"But it's all in the past." He continued. "All those people know you. They know how you are. Trust me, nobody in Adventure Bay thinks you're bad at what you do, and neither do we. They wouldn't hate you either! You're too nice!"

"Except Rocky…" Marshall whispered sadly, recalling Rocky's annoyance at getting sprayed twice. "I don't know how he keeps putting up with me..."

"How many times has that pup told you now? He could never hate you no matter how many times you get him wet. Rocky can't hold a grudge at all. He loves you like he loves everyone else here. You know that."

It was true that Rocky had forgiven Marshall, and Rocky had even told him outright that he felt bad over storming off the way he did, and the two had hugged it out.

"But all that doesn't change how useless I am!" Marshall shouted, the pain in his voice evident. "If I wasn't such a dumb klutz, none of this would've happened! I can't even do anything by myself without help!" Marshall's grasp on Chase tightened, as if he was scared to let go. The pup sniffled a couple of times, with spasms accompanying each one. "I wish I could be more like you..."

"More like me?" Chase echoed, before letting out a hefty sigh. "You're REALLY not thinking straight, Marshall. Ryder's said it before, and now I'm gonna say it. The Paw Patrol wouldn't be the Paw Patrol without you. None of us want you to change. We all love you for who you are, clumsiness and all. Not only that, but you're missing the point of a team. The reason we're all here is because we all can do stuff the others can't. I mean, you couldn't fly a helicopter or fix a fence." At that moment, a familiar, encouraging levity had returned to the pup's voice. "But you can put out fires and help people when they get hurt! I couldn't do any of that! Plus, I don't know if you've noticed, but I can be pretty clumsy, too!"

Marshall had frozen and fallen quiet at those last couple of words. A few seconds passed before Marshall finally broke the hug, pulling away from Chase slightly and giving him a thoroughly-unimpressed look, as if he'd just heard the most ridiculous thing in the world.

"...really. You."

"You know I'm right..." Chase smirked.

"Are you living on another planet, Chase?" Marshall's face had changed to an annoyed glare. "Name three times you've been clumsy."

"You're on." Chase replied immediately, without really thinking, much to Marshall's surprise.

As much as mishaps and pratfalls in the Paw Patrol were associated with Marshall, Chase knew that it was hardly territory that was exclusive to him. Every pup had their share of silly moments, and Chase, for all his professionalism, was no exception. His first thought was accidentally putting himself and Rocky to sleep with Officer Bear while they were supposed to be on guard duty. But then he realised that perhaps a memory that Marshall was actually present for would stop the dalmatian from denying that it happened.

"Let's see..." Chase took a couple of seconds to comb his mind for ideas, before smirking with amusement. "You remember that bat that went to sleep in City Hall's bell tower? It was all going so well. You were climbing your ladder, you nearly had it, but who has twelve toes and couldn't keep his big yap shut? Or even aim his net?"

Chase couldn't stop himself from faintly giggling at the memory of him getting them both stuck under a net. Marshall was staring at the floor, avoiding eye contact with him, but Chase couldn't help but notice something. Marshall looked like he was shaking. He was obviously trying to keep his face hidden, but that couldn't hide the repeated quick breaths shooting from his nostrils. Chase's spirits soared, escaping from his mouth in the form of laughter. He didn't quite expect the treatment to work that quickly.

"See?" Chase said. "You're laughing!"

Marshall soon transitioned to a full-on giggle fit, responding to Chase's observation with a playful shove that sent the laughing shepherd onto his back.

"What the heck made you think that was a good idea?!" Marshall demanded through his laughter.

"I don't know!" Chase replied through laughter of his own. "But see, you're not the only one who's clumsy!"

Slowly, Marshall got a grip on himself once more, the smile not leaving his lips. "Nice try, Chase."

"Stubborn, huh?" Chase grinned, picking himself back up. "You sure we're not ACTUALLY brothers? Anyways…"

Chase searched for another occasion of his misfortune. "...oh yeah, you remember when those penguins got loose? One ended up spilling a bunch of ice everywhere, right? Do I have to remind you that you weren't the only one who went for a ride that day? I was sliding around all over the place, too!"

Marshall flashed back to the pair of them failing miserably to catch the penguin as they rocketed around on a set of ice cubes. "It was kinda fun, thinking about it… Even though I can't skate worth beans..."

"Heh, no-one can with skates that small…" Chase replied with his head in the past, before shaking himself off after a moment. "...and oh yeah, remember when Mandy got loose?" Perhaps now, Marshall would be more receptive to hearing memories that he wasn't there for. "I tried to net her then, too. All I got was Ryder, and lemme tell you, he did NOT care for that little slip-up..."

Marshall's face shifted to one of confusion. "Huh? I don't think he ever told us that..."

It wasn't exactly a memory that Ryder was keen to share. Being netted by his pup was not his idea of a good time, after all.

"Our little secret." Chase replied. His face quickly turned deathly-serious. "And I don't mean a Marshall Secret, either. I mean a 'not a peep to the others or I'll tickle you till you explode' secret." Chase glared at Marshall, pressing his nose against the dalmatian's. "GOT IT?"

Marshall pulled back slightly, feeling a little intimidated. "OK, OK…" He said hurriedly. "My lips are sealed..."

"ARE THEY?!" Chase yelled with a wicked grin, throwing himself on top of Marshall and quickly kneading the dalmatian's squishy, white belly.

"EEK-!" Marshall shrieked, collapsing into hysterics. "Hee hee hee hee hee! Ch-Chase, no-! Pfft-hahahahaha!"

Marshall desperately tried to wriggle out of Chase's grip, but the shepherd was keeping a stronger hold on Marshall than he thought, rendering the ticklish pup entirely helpless.

"OK, OK, HAHAHA!" Marshall yelled through his mirthful spasms. "N-NOT A WORD, HAHAHAHA! I SWEAR! AHAHAHAHAHA!"

Satisfied with Marshall's surrender, Chase kept his paws still, grinning smugly down at his friend.

"That's more like it..." Chase sneered playfully.

Marshall panted heavily, trying to get back some of the life that was just tickled out of him. "You… you're evil..." Marshall gasped, still smiling the whole while.

"Ababababa! 'Persuasive', Marshall." Chase corrected with the same smug smile on his face.

"Whatever helps you sleep at night..."

A few seconds passed of Marshall catching his breath. Underneath Chase's playful grin, Chase was starting to feel deeply relieved. It looked like Marshall was coming back around to his old, playful self, with the bitter, furious Marshall now a thing of the past. Having later caught his breath. Marshall looked up at Chase, who was now smiling warmly down at him.

"So?" Chase began. "What do I win?"

Marshall froze, realising that Chase had just met his challenge easily. "…I… er…" He stammered.

"See?" The smile hadn't left Chase's face. "You aren't the only one who's clumsy and makes mistakes. And even if you were, you know we all love you no matter what. That's just part of who you are. We all know you didn't mean to trip over that paint can or get the ball stuck in that tree. And what you said back there? About knowing what we all think? Totally wrong."

Chase leaned in, pressing his nose against Marshall's and fixing him with a firm look. "You're. NOT. Useless." Chase pulled back one more, his expression changing to a gentler one. "We all know why you're our fire pup. You're nice, you're brave, you never slow down and you know what? You're smarter than you think." Chase smiled encouragingly. "You know when you fooled Sid and Arrby by going overboard with your clumsiness? That takes brains, pal! I know the Marshall we all know and love is in there somewhere. Where did he go?"

Marshall was stunned by Chase's speech. All of his depression and frustration had just been obliterated in a few moments. "Well…" Marshall stuttered. "He had a really bad day… He left for a little while..."

"He needs to come back." Chase quickly replied. "Like I said, we all have bad days. But tomorrow's a new day to look forward to." Chase placed his paws on Marshall's shoulders "And if you're really feeling rotten, you need to tell us. We're all happy to help you. That's what a family's all about, after all. And like I said, tomorrow's a new day. Do your best and forget the rest, right?"

Marshall slowly started to sit up. He felt emotion start to well up in his stomach again. But this time, it wasn't anger. It was happiness. Even despite his failings and his furious outburst that day, he had friends that would never turn their back on him. Brothers and sisters who would forgive him and pull him back out of any dark hole he found himself in. Just as he would do for them.

"...yeah…" Marshall whispered, looking at the floor. "Do my best… forget the rest…" Marshall finally saw fit to look at Chase. The dalmatian's eyes were noticably wetter than usual. "Chase, I think I was wrong."

"Huh?" Chase looked slightly confused. "Wrong?"

"I said you don't deserve me… But it's more like I don't deserve you… You're too good to me..."

"Silly pup." Chase soothed, smiling warmly once more. "Deserve me or not, I'll always be here for you. Like you're always here for me. If you need me, I'll be there. Heck, I'll even be there if you don't need me."

That did it. Chase had officially opened the floodgates. A few seconds of silence preceded Marshall completely breaking down in tears. All it took was one little push to render Marshall too overwhelmingly-overjoyed for words.

"...oh, g-g-great!" Marshall sobbed with a huge, tearful smile on his face. "N-now you're making me c-cry! Y-you really are evil!"

Marshall rushed forward and gratefully threw his arms around Chase, who responded in-kind immediately, holding Marshall close and allowing the pup to cry on his shoulder. It was official. Marshall was back. Chase struggled not to cry himself. For all of his doubts and fear that Marshall hated him, and if he was too far gone to listen to anyone, now he was expressing his gratitude for Chase's handiwork by sobbing joyfully into his fur. All in all, it was a job well done.

"Not evil…" Chase whispered with a relieved smile. "'Persuasive'..."

The two pups must've sat holding each other for about five minutes while Marshall slowly stopped crying and Chase forced back his own tears. Eventually, though, Marshall pulled back slightly while not letting go of Chase.

"Chase, I…" Marshall whispered. "I can't thank you enough..."

"Psh, I don't need thanks." Chase scoffed, punctuating his words with an affectionate noogie that made Marshall groan and giggle before Chase placed his arm back around Marshall's shoulder. "We've got your smile back and you're calm again. That's all I need right now."

Marshall smiled warmly, until he remembered his earlier outburst and his smile faded. The other pups were probably deeply hurt by his earlier eruption. Slowly, Marshall began to feel like a very bad friend indeed.

"I... think I owe the pups an apology..." Marshall said guiltily, looking down at the floor again.

"Yeah, you do. But there's nothing to be afraid of. You know as well as I do that they'll forgive you." Chase placed his paw under Marshall's chin, moving his head up to meet his gaze. "Besides, it's not like you're gonna be alone for that, either. I'll be right there with you."

"And as long as you're here, I'll never be alone… right?" Marshall asked, with the smile returning to his face.

Chase responded by pulling Marshall close again and nuzzling the pup. "Absolutely." he quietly affirmed.

Marshall was quick to return the favour. "Then lead the way…" He whispered. "Big brother..."

After an affectionate squeeze from Chase, the two finally broke their embrace and headed to the Lookout. And sure enough, apart from "punishment" in the form of further noogies and light slaps to the head, Chase was right. The pups were quick to call things even and completely forgive Marshall, even adding that they were more upset that he'd try to bottle up how frustrated he was, and that he could always see them if he wanted to talk things out. There was only one thing Marshall wished that he'd realised sooner.

He was far luckier than he knew.

* * *

_**And that's one of the heavier fics out of the way. Like I said, I feel like this is the point where they really start to get good. But if you'd believe it, this one isn't my favourite. That honour goes to next week's fic, and I'm itching to upload that one. But this was actually one of the earlier stories I wrote, iand for a long time, it was the one I was most happy with.  
**_

_**Not much to say on this one, so I'll move on to something that others have done that I fancy doing now. Review responses! Yep, like some before me, I got some reviews that I'd quite like to reply to on Minding the Medic, so without further ado, here goes:**_

* * *

_**PupPupGo****: Perhaps it's empathy? People can relate to being sick, and that makes them want to see the character get better. And as much as vomit would probably be taboo on a TV-Y show, an episode where Marshall gets sick and the pups have to step out of their comfort zones (in terms of a rescue ****going on that he'd be needed for and in having to take care of him) would certainly be a fun one to watch.**_

_**VenusDemilo-Shirolover2****: I mainly keep the description and title at the top of the fics since they're all meant to be their own standalone stories ****and I try to keep things organised. I'll cut the descriptions out if they're too bothersome, though. I think us both writing sick fics about the pups was a happy coincidence, actually. I had the idea to write one kicking around since shortly after Bulldog in a Bind. By the way, great job on More Than a Cold so far!**_

_**Zojak****: Well, most illnesses have an incubation period of a few days before the symptoms strike, hence why Chase started to feel ill about five days after coming into contact with Marshall. I left the country on a Saturday and didn't start to feel ill until the Friday, for what it's worth. Plus, dogs can do everything in this show, so they can probably get ****human illnesses, too. As for where it took place, it was the bottom level of the Lookout. Chase went up the elevator, got into Marshall's gear and took the slide down to the ground. Let's just say he was going through a gear check before the pups set out. And with Chase and Marshall both gone, the pups would need to work overtime to fix all of the sabotage the kittens were causing, as well as chasing them away.**_

_**Entity of**__** Spite**__**: I don't know if I'd go as far as to say that I help to keep the thread alive, but I'm still humbled that you feel that way. Thank you, and I hope you enjoy what's to come!**_

_**LuigiWife1551**__**: I wasn't exactly a healthy child, so I've had my fair share of vile medication in my time. I like to think I write what I know!  
**_

_**SharpDragonKlaw: Perhaps more impressive since flu can really mess with your head. Trust me, I know.**_

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_**Thank you all for your reviews. I do love reading them. And I hope you enjoy the next fic to come, which will be another (relatively) lighter one. Here's the description for you all. Hope to see you Sunday.**_

* * *

**_WHATEVER IT TAKES_**

**When it comes to protecting those you love, how far can you go before crossing the line? Even though Chase and Marshall never asked this question, they receive an answer after a rare display of violence gets them suspended from the team. But time for guilt leaves time for reflection as the two ruminate on their error.  
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	4. Whatever it Takes

**_WHATEVER IT TAKES_**

**When it comes to protecting those you love, how far can you go before crossing the line? Even though Chase and Marshall never asked this question, they receive an answer after a rare display of violence gets them suspended from the team. But time for guilt leaves time for reflection as the two ruminate on their error.**

* * *

Chase and Marshall had always thought of themselves as good pups. As the firefighter and police officer of Adventure Bay, they had to lead by example when it came to their behaviour, and they never thought of themselves as having problems with anger or poor behaviour.

But the current lecture Ryder was giving them was causing them to have second thoughts.

The day had started off innocently enough. Rocky was out picking up trash in Adventure Bay as he did sometimes. Adventure Bay may have been clean, but it was far from spotless. Until he found a trail of garbage that seemed to lead to a spot in an isolated alleyway. When it abruptly stopped and he realised that he was in a dead end, he realised too late that he'd just been baited into a trap as one of Humdinger's kittens threw a net over the mix.

Nobody was any the wiser until the portly, sneering mayor had contacted Ryder, showing him that he had Rocky suspended in a cage over a pond in the woods, threatening to soak the pup over and over until the Paw Patrol publicly denounced themselves in front of Adventure Bay, telling them that they were unworthy of being their defenders, and that Mayor Humdinger would be a better fit for the town.

Naturally, the Paw Patrol took this badly, but no-one took it as badly as Chase, who found himself in a rare display of lashing out in anger when hearing the news. But the pups weren't expecting Marshall to become quiet and distant throughout the mission. The Paw Patrol split into three teams of two in a bid to find their missing recycling pup, and Chase and Marshall were the ones to do it and liberate Rocky from above the pond with Marshall's ladder. The mix had responded by tackle-hugging the dalmatian down the ladder, licking Chase silly and telling them both how amazing their rescue was.

But when Rocky had gushed to Ryder about just how they managed it, it was Ryder's turn to get angry. He'd never expected his pups to downright torture Humdinger into giving up the key to Rocky's cage. He wasn't seriously hurt, but the mayor was covered in bruises from Chase's tennis ball launcher and soaking wet from being nearly drowned by Marshall's water cannons, and he was crying like a baby as the cherry on top. When Ryder turned around from his reunion hug with Rocky and calmly told the two pups to see him back at the Lookout, the fear from the shepherd and dalmatian was palpable.

Ryder had been reading the two of them the riot act for a few minutes now, and only then did the pups realise that they may have gone too far.

"We… were just angry..." Marshall squeaked in a feeble bid to defend the two of them.

"And everyone else wasn't?" Ryder shot back, calmly, yet obviously bitterly disappointed. "Getting angry is NEVER an excuse for attacking someone the way you two did. I would've thought that you two, of all pups, would know better."

"There… There's no excuse for what we did, is there?" Chase whimpered, looking guiltily down at the floor.

"No." Ryder sharply replied. "We're the Paw Patrol. We don't attack people. We save people. It doesn't matter who they are. Even if it's Humdinger, even if they…" Ryder gritted his teeth and clenched his fist. "...kidnap one of us…" The boy then sighed and continued. "...getting violent like that is NOT the answer. Plus, Humdinger could probably use something like that against us. Don't pretend he wouldn't."

Being called out the way they were stung badly. But on reflection, the two had to admit, they deserved it. They weren't violent pups by any stretch of the imagination. And it was as Ryder said, their duty was to save people, not rough them up, regardless of how evil they may be. Otherwise, that made them no better than their enemies.

"However, you DID save Rocky." Ryder continued after a pause and another sigh. "Credit where credit is due, you both did well in bringing him back safe."

These words didn't do a great deal to make the two feel better. "But you've still gotta punish us… right?" Chase quietly asked, without looking at Ryder.

"I'm sorry, but yes. As I've said, the Paw Patrol does NOT attack people, regardless of what they've done or who they are. And you're both some of the most crucial pups on the team. I expect you to act like it. So you both need to take time off the team to think about what you've done. Three days of suspension ought to do it."

Chase looked up at Ryder in surprise. "Huh? Three days? For that?"

Ryder gave Chase a displeased glare. "Do you want me to make it longer?"

In return, Chase's eyes shot open. "Er, I-"

"NO! WE'RE GOOD!" Marshall loudly interrupted in a bid to keep them from getting into further trouble.

"That's what I thought. Chase. Marshall. Please turn in your pup tags."

This demand from their leader cut them deeply. Ashamedly, the two very slowly sauntered forward and sat down, their heads bowed the whole while. They reached behind them and pressed a button on their collars, detaching the silver, shield-shaped tags that hung from their necks, letting them drop to the floor. Using their noses, the two pushed the tags to Ryder's feet.

"Ryder, sir… We're so sorry..." Marshall whimpered.

"No need to get like that, Marshall." Ryder replied in a reassuring tone as he kneeled down to pick up the pair's tags. "You're both in trouble, but if either of you want some advice on dealing with this kind of thing, you've just gotta come talk to me."

Ryder didn't like having to punish his pups either. Not only were they better than this, but it was plain as day that they hated to see their leader disappointed in them. But he couldn't let this unexpected bout of violence go unpunished. Not only did he not raise a group of attack dogs, but if Humdinger could take advantage of this kind of anger, he could very easily use it to discredit the group as a pack of violent vigilantes.

"Do you… hate us?" Chase asked weakly. Ryder's eyes shot open in response as he instinctively found himself protectively throwing his arms around the two of them

"What?! No!" Ryder barked, to the pair's shock. "I'm disappointed that you'd go that far, yeah, but you know full well that I could never hate you!"

The two were staring at Ryder in bewilderment. How could he be raking them over the coals one minute, but adamantly denying hating them the next? Ryder stared at the pair of them for a little while before taking a deep breath and rubbing their backs.

"You're both still learning." Ryder gently told them. "Just like everyone else here. Sometimes, you've gotta make mistakes like that. Sometimes you've gotta go wrong so the rest of us can set you straight. In the end, you'll know what not to do and you'll come out better pups than before. And that goes for all of you."

The two found themselves feeling better, all of a sudden. Not by much, but it was something. Ryder always had the funniest ways of encouraging his pups.

"When you come back to the team, you'll both come back even better, right?"

The pups found resolve welling up in their bodies. "Yeah… yeah, we will… We can do that!" Marshall barked excitedly.

"Ryder, sir… thank you." Chase said with a soft smile.

"Anytime, Chase, Marshall. You're both excused." Ryder gently informed the pair as he got back up, allowing them to head for the door.

"Oh, pups?" Ryder called after them, stopping them as they were halfway through the door of his room. "By the way… Great job rescuing Rocky."

Chase's mind repeated the scene over and over. The shepherd lay listlessly in his pup house. As refreshing as it was that Ryder was disappointed rather than angry, and was still happy that they saved Rocky, Chase still couldn't help but feel guilty. He prided himself as a nonviolent kind of pup, but his playing of the bad cop alongside Marshall had left him haunted. But in truth, Chase had been playing the bad cop from the moment Ryder had announced what their mission was going to be.

* * *

"_Paw Patrol ready… for… ac… tion?" Chase's words died in his throat when he saw Ryder looking more vexed than ever. The shepherd prayed that they hadn't been bad._

"_Pups… I'm gonna cut right to the chase." Ryder began flatly. "Have you noticed someone missing?"_

"_Yeah, Rocky isn't here." Rubble observed. And it was true that the grey mixed breed was nowhere to be seen. "Where is he?"_

_Ryder emitted a growling sigh, clenching his fists. "...Humdinger's got him."_

_The pups emitted a shocked gasp._

"_WHAT?!" Chase roared, as if a switch had been flicked within him as the thought of his friend being stolen away._

"_No!" Zuma cried. "Is he OK?!"_

"_Humdinger's saying that he's gonna soak him in the pond until we give him what he wants." Ryder explained, audibly angry._

"_No… How could he?! What does he want?!" Skye yelled._

"_SKYE, DO NOT EVEN THINK ABOUT GIVING THAT SLIMEBALL WHAT HE WANTS!" Chase snapped, whipping around and glaring at the cockapoo._

"_Chase! Down!" Ryder commanded. "Get that temper under control right this minute!" Chase, for his part, didn't budge, growling the whole while._

"_Anyway, he wants us to smear ourselves in front of the whole town."_

"_No. We're not doing that." Marshall sharply, if flatly, replied._

"_ABSOLUTELY NOT!" Chase replied just as sharply, but perhaps not as flatly._

"_Chase… temper…" Ryder sternly intoned. "But he's right. We're not."_

* * *

Ryder had split them into teams. Chase and Marshall covered one area of the forest, Rubble and Zuma covered another, and Skye and Ryder ran general recon together. Chase's allergies had led them to the pond, and one co-ordinated set of attacks later, the kittens had run away from a combination of nets and water cannons from the pair, and Mayor Humdinger was trapped on the floor as Chase had fired another net at him.

"Hey, Chase… Er, can I come in?"

Chase found himself jolted from his thoughts by Marshall, who had poked his head around the corner with a similarly haunted look on his face.

"Oh, yeah, sure, pull up a house." Chase quickly replied, shuffling to the side. Marshall quickly took the invitation and laid down next to the shepherd, quickly directing his gaze to the floor.

"I… gotta say, I didn't know you had that kind of a vicious side." Chase observed in a bid to strike up a conversation.

It was true that Marshall was one of the last pups that Chase had expected to have an angry side. But muted though it was, it was very much there, as Marshall had made clear during the search.

* * *

"_Got anything?" Marshall asked._

"…_AAAAAAAAH-CHOO!" Chase emitted a violent sneeze. "That answer your question?"_

"_Kinda. I guess they've been down this way."_

"_AAAAH-CHOO! AAAAH-CHOO! AAAAAAAAAAHH-CHOO!" Chase had upgraded to a sneezing fit. "Urgh… it's getting stronger… this way..."_

"_Hey!" Marshall pointed with his paw. "Aren't those tracks?"_

_It was true. Tire tracks that didn't match any of the Paw Patrol's vehicles. They weren't far from Chase's face, but they were definitely there._

"_Ah-ha! That's gotta be that catmobile thing!" Chase observed._

"_I guess we're close, then. We're gonna get Rocky back."_

"_Not so fast. I've got a plan."_

_Chase went on to explain his plan of attack to the dalmatian, who listened intently, looking more serious than usual._

"_Make sense?" Chase asked._

"_One hundred percent." Marshall replied._

"_Good. You ready, Marshall?"_

"_No..." Marshall replied flatly, his eyebrows furrowing into a glare. "...I'm angry."_

* * *

Marshall could only whine at the reminder of his sudden turn towards the dark side.

"Neither did I… I… I don't like it, Chase. It makes me feel… dirty."

"Hey, I wasn't much better." Chase reassured. "Didn't you see me screaming in Humdinger's face?"

"I barely noticed, actually. I was so angry..."

"Well, so was I. I guess it's not like we didn't have a reason, though."

"It was a pretty good reason, not gonna lie. But the worst part is… well, I don't feel THAT bad about what I did."

"Huh?" Chase whipped around, shocked at Marshall's confession. "Marshall, are you crazy? You do realize that we got in enough trouble for beating up Humdinger like that, right?"

"I don't like that I got that angry… But it… feels kinda worth it, actually."

"'Worth it'?!" Chase spat in shock. "How could being suspended for three days be worth it?!"

"Because it doesn't matter if you're Humdinger, Sweetie, or even some kind of dragon..." Marshall had slowly raised a paw into the air, before slamming it into the floor with extreme conviction, his face shifting to a determined glare.

"...NOBODY hurts my family."

Chase had to admit, he was shocked by the suddenly display of stern conviction. "But there are better ways of getting one over on people like that!"

"I know. And I don't wanna get so angry as to hurt someone again. But hey. It was just the one time. And again, one of our friends being put in danger like that is a pretty good reason to get angry." Marshall finally found the resolve to look back at Chase. "Don't act like you don't think the same."

"Well…" Chase tried to find a rebuttal, but he had to admit, Marshall had him there.

Thinking about it, it was kind of hypocritical that he was shocked over Marshall getting overprotectively angry. It wasn't as if Chase had much of a leg to stand on in that regard.

"OK, yeah. Guess I wouldn't be much of a leader if I didn't, right?" Chase soon found a small, if rueful, smile returning to his face. "Plus, Rocky thought us interrogating Humdinger like that was pretty cool."

"He was pretty grateful, huh?" Marshall smiled back at the shepherd. "I'd say that alone made it worth it. That and… well, getting to spray Humdinger's smug butt wasn't too bad, either."

"Not every day you get to bean that troublemaker with tennis balls, either…" Chase replied, his mind replaying the scene of their interrogation after they had routed Humdinger's kitten minions.

* * *

"_WHERE?! IS?! THE?! KEY?!" Chase roared, his muzzle barely inches away from Mayor Humdinger's face._

"_Urgh, Ryder isn't very good to you, is he?" the netted Humdinger asked condescendingly. "He doesn't ever brush your teeth, clearly!"_

"_TENNIS BALLS, FIRE!" Chase shouted, as another salvo of tennis balls flew forth from the launcher on his back, battering the bruised Humdinger's face, causing him to yelp and shout pathetically._

"_I'M GETTING REALLY TIRED OF PLAYING WITH YOU, HUMDINGER! KEY! NOW!"_

"_Urgh… Say please, you rude little beagle!" Humdinger defiantly spat._

"_FIRE!" Another salvo of tennis balls struck Humdinger between the legs, causing him to howl in pain before curling up and crying. While all of this was going on, Marshall stood a small distance away, watching with a blank expression on his face and Rocky watched from his cage, astonished by what was going on below him._

"_I'M NOT GONNA TELL YOU AGAIN! GIVE US BACK OUR FRIEND OR I'LL DO THAT A HUNDRED MORE TIMES!"_

"_N… N-never! Not until you give me what I want!" Humdinger smirked through his obvious pain._

_Chase was quaking with rage. Humdinger was close to breaking. He knew it. But the temptation to lunge at him and chew his fingers off grew more and more. Normally, Chase wouldn't treat Humdinger as anything more than an annoyance. But now, Humdinger had turned things deeply personal, and Chase was treating it accordingly._

"_Say, Mayor Humdinger?" Marshall asked calmly, seizing his moment with a lull in the conversation._

"_Urgh. What?" Humdinger rudely replied._

"_I've got a question of my own, actually."_

"_You can be as nice as you like, I'm not giving you the key. Not until you all tell Adventure Bay what's good for them." Humdinger sneered._

"_No, no, it's nothing to do with that." Marshall said, with a disarming casualness to his voice. "Just hear me out a sec."_

"_Ugh, these pesky pups..." Humdinger muttered. "Alright. I'll humor you."_

"_Sweet, thanks." Marshall replied with a sugary breeziness. "So I was wondering… do you know what it's like to drown?"_

"'_Drown'?" Humdinger echoed with a scoff. It wasn't as if the pups had the strength to drag him over to the pond. "No, I can't say I have. Why?"_

"_Water cannon… arf." Marshall muttered as quietly as he could. As his cannons sprang forth from his Pup Pack, Marshall whipped around with a glare that could melt stone. What Marshall meant quickly hit Humdinger hard, who turned as white as Marshall's fur._

"_Wanna find out?"_

* * *

It didn't take long for Marshall's impromptu waterboarding combined with Chase's battering to get Humdinger to break, throwing the key at the pups and begging them to leave him alone, crying almost the entire while. Chase shuddered slightly at the memory. They were all nice pups, and none of them had ever made a grown man cry before. Even though Humdinger had the mental maturity of someone a tenth of his age.

"I know it's not right, but there's one thing we have in common." Marshall observed.

"We'd do anything to protect each other?" Chase predicted.

"Yep. Like when Sweetie tried to frame you. She's really lucky I had a grip on myself then, or else I probably would've shot her out the window with my Hydro Launcher."

Chase blinked, surprised to hear those kinds of words come from Marshall. "You'd do that for me?"

"Is that even a question?" Marshall replied with slight indignation. "Haven't we just spent the last few minutes talking about how we'd do anything for each other?"

"...you really are something, Marshall." Chase said in amazement.

"Hey, we all know you'd do the same for us."

"Heh, yeah. When Sid and Arrby captured you… Well, it's probably a good thing Ryder assigned me to the lighthouse. If he didn't, I probably would've shot my net at both of them and dumped them overboard."

Both pups giggled at the thought, before their faces fell once more. Perhaps they were more violent than they liked to admit. They were protective, but that didn't really excuse getting physical.

"...this is a problem, isn't it?" Marshall asked. "Our violence, I mean."

"Oh yeah." Chase replied firmly. "But thinking about it, it could've been worse. I mean, we could've bitten him until he gave up the key."

"Urgh, Chase, don't-!" Marshall gagged, clasping his paws over his mouth at the thought of biting someone.

"Sorry, sorry…" Chase watched as Marshall stopped himself from losing his breakfast. "But even though it could've been worse, we can't do this again. Like Ryder said, we're rescuers, not attack dogs..."

"Guh… Well, Ryder offered to talk to us about it, right? Wanna go together in a few?"

"I was gonna ask you that." Chase flashed a grin at his friend. "We'll find a way to protect each other without getting violent. Like he said, Humdinger could use something like that against us."

"I'm sure we'll find a way." Marshall returned the favour with an optimistic smile. "It doesn't have to be violent, right? We'll always have a way to rescue each other."

"Yeah. After all. We'd go around the world and back to keep each other safe."

Marshall extended a paw towards Chase, who happily high-fived him.

"Whatever it takes."

"Whatever it takes."

The two had to admit, this little heart-to-heart made them feel much better. They may have done wrong, but it was just another bump in the road for them to overcome. And it was refreshing to have the confirmation that they were as protective of their family as each other. And they knew that they were both determined enough to find another way to protect everyone. The consolation that Humdinger wasn't likely to try and take one of them hostage again any time soon helped, too. The two pups lay in Chase's pup house quietly for a few minutes, simply enjoying one another's company until a familiar grey pup came trotting up.

"Hey, guys!" Rocky cheerfully greeted the two.

"Hey, Rocky." Chase greeted the mix. "Feel better?"

"I've been feeling better since you got me out of Humdinger's trap, Chase!" Rocky replied with a big grin. Chase and Marshall couldn't stop themselves from smiling in return at seeing Rocky so happy. But it didn't take long for the mixed breed to adopt a more serious face.

"...look, I'm sorry Ryder punished you two." Rocky said sincerely. "I should've known he'd do that. I guess I got too excited over seeing what you did back there." As excited as Rocky was, he didn't want to get the two of them in trouble.

"No need to apologize to us, Rocky." Marshall replied. "We shouldn't have gotten so angry that we'd attack Humdinger like that."

"Hard to blame you both. He IS Humdinger, after all." Rocky said with a hint of levity.

"But that doesn't mean we should've done it!" Chase maintained.

"Maybe not..." Rocky said, before moving in and laying down, placing a paw on the backs of their heads, and alternating between nuzzling the pair of them.

"...but either way, you both saved me." he whispered. "And it was awesome to watch. Thank you both… for everything."

Rocky's gratitude brought the smiles back to the pups' faces. "It was all worth it this time, Rocky." Marshall replied warmly.

Rocky stood back up. "You know, I was just about to head to Mr. Porter's for some cake. You guys wanna come with? My treat for saving me."

Marshall perked up, immediately getting to his feet with a huge grin. "You had me at 'cake'!"

Rocky burst out laughing. "Heh, you sound like Rubble, Marshall." Rocky grinned with amusement.

"Well, getting punished for being violent leaves a pup kinda hungry." Marshall joked in response as he left Chase's pup house.

Chase could only snicker under his breath. It really was amazing how quickly his friends could bounce back from a bad situation...

"Chase?" Marshall asked, turning back to him with Rocky at his side. "You coming with?"

...but then, so could he. Being snapped back to reality by Marshall's words, Chase got to his feet with a warm smile.

"Sure thing."

* * *

_**...should I have put an out of character warning somewhere above this fic? I probably should have. I know that Chase is shown to be protective of the other pups in the show (and kind of a worrywart about them), but I doubt he'd be shown to go this far. Marshall is a bit of a different case in this regard, though. I get the feeling that, deep down, he's just as protective of the others. And he may be a silly joker, but I think he'd be TERRIFYING if pushed far enough. And if things got bad enough, he'd stop messing around and reboot into seek and destroy mode if he needed to. As they say: it's the ones you least expect you gotta watch out for. How they'd show this on the show is beyond me, though.**_

_**Now... I feel the need to warn you. If Boiling Over seemed heavy to you, then think about that for the next fic... and multiply it by a factor of 11. This next one is going to be Heavy with a capital H. But that said, it also happens to be not only one of the longer fics, but also my favourite of the bunch, and I'm honestly excited to get to share it with you. But until then, you'll have to make do with this preview. Hope to see you Wednesday.**_

* * *

_**ERUPTION**_

**Many a word has been used to describe Chase. Controlled. Professional. Protective. Worrywart. The last two especially so, thanks to Chase's love for the other pups. And when Marshall takes an unnecessary risk on a rescue, Chase reaches his limits and goes too far in a fit of uncontrolled fury. The actions of the two pups end up scarring each other, but the same two pups are also the only ones who can heal each other's wounds.**


	5. Eruption

_**ERUPTION**_

**Many a word has been used to describe Chase. Controlled. Professional. Protective. Worrywart. The last two especially so, thanks to Chase's love for the other pups. And when Marshall takes an unnecessary risk on a rescue, Chase reaches his limits and goes too far in a fit of uncontrolled fury. The actions of the two pups end up scarring each other, but the same two pups are also the only ones who can heal each other's wounds.**

* * *

"Urgh..."

"Hey! He's waking up!"

The light burned Marshall's eyes as he slowly came to. He wasn't quite sure what had just happened. The last thing he remembered was being called to the Lookout. Now he found himself waking up to Skye's voice.

"Guh… Urrrrggghhhhh… Ugh, wha-" Marshall grumbled.

Slowly, his vision came back into focus, and the multitude of amorphous shapes changed into those of the other pups. Somehow, he found himself back in the Lookout, laying in a dark red pet bed. Everyone had a decidedly perturbed expression on their face. To his right, Ryder was kneeling on the floor looking at him with concern. A small amount of worry worked its way through Marshall's head. Something told him that a rescue had gone wrong somehow. And that he'd made a life-threatening error.

"Marshall! How're you feeling?" Skye asked frantically.

"Ugh… what… happened?" Marshall mumbled.

"You nearly got yourself killed, that's what!" Rocky sharply interrupted, worried anger permeating his words.

"Hey! Wocky! Cool it!" Zuma shot back

"Yeah, he's still out of it!" Rubble added.

"Killed? What are…" Marshall questioned, his worry intensifying.

"Marshall, don't you remember? We were fighting a fire in Mr. Porter's store?" Ryder asked gently.

The memories started to come back to him, the blanks in his mind filling back in. Ryder had called them together thanks to an electrical fire in the store, and Marshall, naturally, had to take point in putting it out. The fire was more monstrous than he was used to, but it wasn't anything he couldn't manage.

"...actually, yeah… I kinda do. Agh-!" Marshall suddenly cringed, moving a paw to his head as pain flared up within.

"Whoa! Take it easy, Marshall!" Skye yelled. "Your head's still kinda sensitive!"

"Ugh… I remember we… had to save Alex…" Marshall continued.

"Again." Zuma dryly interjected.

"...but what made this happen? The last thing I remember is pushing him out the front door."

Sadly, Alex had ended up in the wrong place at the wrong time. Alex had gotten himself stuck as he tried to do something about the fire himself. With Alex getting buried alive being the only thing on his mind, Marshall had charged in recklessly, helping him out of the debris that was pinning him down and helping him towards the exit. And indeed, the last thing he remembered was the ceiling starting to fall in around him, and he acted on instinct, shoving Alex towards the store's exit as hard as he could.

"Some rubble came down and hit you in the head." Ryder explained.

"Hey! I didn't have anything to do with this!" Rubble joked in a bid to lighten the mood. The sea of disapproving looks showed that it didn't work, however.

"Not a good time, Rubble." Skye gently admonished.

"But Alex is safe, right?" Marshall asked.

"He is. But you weren't." Ryder retorted. "We took you down to Katie's and she said the worst that'll happen is this and a few bruises. But you know what she said? She said 'If it was anyone but Marshall, this could've been way worse'."

"You're lucky you've got such a hard head, Marshall!" Rocky sharply interrupted. "Most other pups would be dead! YOU could've been dead!"

"Rocky, you're yelling. Ease up." Ryder commanded quietly.

"Oh… sorry." Rocky turned from angry-looking to embarrassed.

"But he isn't wrong." Ryder continued with a firm look. "Marshall, what you did was VERY dangerous. I know it's your job to save people, but there are other ways of saving them than running in head-on."

"But Alex was in danger!" Marshall countered.

"Not IMMEDIATE danger. We could've come up with a plan if you didn't charge in. All that does is put yourself in danger, too."

Ryder sighed, laying a hand on the dalmatian's head. "Marshall… I'm disappointed. But I'm not mad. Once you're better, we'll talk strategy. You might have saved Alex, but taking unnecessary risks like that is not good for you or any one of us."

Marshall had attempted to deny the ramifications of his actions, but seeing Ryder upset with him caused everything to hit him. Suddenly, he felt extremely guilty. Not only did he get injured, but all he did was worry everyone. Something told him that if he didn't wear a helmet all the time, he would've come away with something far worse than a headache and some lost memories. If he came away at all, that is.

"Ryder, sir… I'm sorry." Marshall whispered, his head weighed down by guilt.

Ryder sighed again, reassuringly rubbing Marshall's head in a bid to soothe him. "If you're really sorry, you'll get better and then come see me. Right now, the important thing is that you're safe."

Marshall sighed, looking around the room to see everyone looking relieved, if worried. It wouldn't be the first time Marshall had taken big risks, but rarely did they endanger him to such a degree. He internally vowed to make good on what Ryder had asked him. He couldn't keep worrying everyone like this.

But it didn't take long for someone to catch Marshall's eye. Chase had been stood at the back with a blank expression. He hadn't spoken a word the entire time. Marshall felt his stomach sink. Something told him that Chase had not taken his gamble well.

"Chase?" Marshall piped up after a few seconds. "You've been kinda quiet. Are you OK?"

"...pups…" Chase began flatly "...can I talk to Marshall alone?"

"(Uh-oh… I've done it now...)" Marshall thought, believing his suspicions to be coming true.

"Pups, let's do as he says." Ryder swiftly commanded, having the burning feeling that he knew what was coming.

He turned to the emotionless-looking shepherd. "Chase. Don't overdo it. Please."

Chase didn't reply as Ryder and the pups apprehensively left the room.

"(This is not going to be pretty...)" Marshall internally bemoaned.

Ryder and the pups disappeared out of the room one by one to wait outside. For a while, the shepherd and dalmatian stared at each other. The atmosphere was thick enough to be cut with a knife. Being unable to take the suspense any longer, Marshall opened his mouth to defend himself.

"Chase, look. I know that was-"

Marshall didn't a chance to finish his sentence. In the blink of an eye, in a few milliseconds. Chase's demeanour changed rapidly. His formerly blank face had changed to one of pure, untempered rage as he stomped his front paws on the bed, one to each side of Marshall's head and shoved his face in closely enough that their noses were close to touching.

"WHAT?! WERE?! YOU?! THINKING?!" Chase roared. "YOU… IDIOT! STUPID, STUPID!"

To say that Marshall was taken aback would be an understatement. "Wh… Wh-wha-?" he stammered, not expecting Chase to get that angry.

"HOW COULD YOU JUST THROW YOURSELF INTO A COLLAPSING ROOM?! YOU SAW AS WELL AS I DID THAT THE BUILDING WAS FALLING APART! YOU'RE LUCKY YOU GOT OUT ALIVE, BUT I MIGHT JUST KILL YOU MYSELF!"

"Chase… Chase, y-you don't mean that..." Marshall stammered fearfully. Seeing a friend this angry with him was more scary than any fire Adventure Bay could throw at him. It didn't feel like Marshall was staring at a friend. It felt like he was staring into the eyes of a snarling demon.

"QUIT BEING SO PIG-HEADED, YOU SELFISH IDIOT! WE KEEP TELLING EACH OTHER TO BE CAREFUL, AND YOU GO AND NEARLY GET KILLED! WHY DON'T YOU EVER LISTEN TO US?! WHY DO YOU KEEP PUTTING YOURSELF IN POINTLESS DANGER?!"

Marshall first decided to try and take things calmly. With Chase so close to him, he couldn't help but notice the small, beady tears of fury that were forming in the shepherd's eyes. "Chase… You know as well as I do how dangerous my job can be." The dalmatian tried his hardest to keep an expression of neutrality. "Sometimes, I have to make on-the-spot decisions. And what was I supposed to do? Let Alex get crushed? Besides, it takes more than a little rubble to kill me. Especially when I'm wearing a helmet."

"YOU'RE! NOT! LISTENING!" Clearly the calm approach hadn't worked. "DON'T YOU DARE SHRUG ME OFF! YOU DON'T CARE ABOUT YOUR OWN SAFETY! YOU KEEP THROWING YOURSELF INTO DANGER! YOU'RE GOING TO GET YOURSELF KILLED! WHAT GOOD IS A DEAD FIRE PUP?! HUH?!"

As much as Marshall tried, he couldn't stop himself from being dragged down to Chase's level. He felt his temper dropping more and more, and now he'd lost it entirely. Marshall got to his feet and glared at Chase.

"...Look in a mirror, why don't you?!" Marshall barked.

"WHAT DID YOU SAY?!" Chase bellowed, apoplectic at being talked back to.

"Why are you yelling at me about danger, Mr. Super Spy Cop?! Have you forgotten what you do?! You go after dangerous people like Humdinger and Sweetie and you're yelling at ME about not caring?!"

"I KNOW WHAT I'M DOING!" Chase had shoved his head against Marshall's.

"SO DO I!" Marshall screamed back, shoving back against Chase's head. "I might've made a bad choice, but that doesn't mean you get to scream at me like I'm some kind of criminal!"

"YOU'RE GOING TO GET KILLED WITH THAT KIND OF ATTITUDE!"

"Oh, so you're gonna make my choices for me?! Get off your high-horse once in a while, you dummy!"

That had done it. Chase's rationality was being held up by a thread, and that thread had just snapped with Marshall's retort. With an inarticulate scream of rage, Chase shot forward, shoving Marshall to the floor and constricting Marshall's neck with his paws, choking the life out of him.

"Chase-! Ack-! What are-?!" Marshall gasped, too shocked to raise a defence.

"WHY?! DON'T YOU?! EVER?! LISTEN?!" Chase screamed in Marshall's face.

"Aggghhhkkkk! Stop! Please-!" Marshall choked, feeling the air leaking from his lungs "I'm… I'm… sorr- ughk!"

Marshall tried to struggle out of Chase's grip, but it simply wasn't enough. The shepherd's anger had overwhelmed any defence that Marshall may have attempted to put up, and the dalmatian could already feel himself getting lightheaded from the lack of air.

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!"

The next sound Marshall heard came from Ryder, who had appeared at the door, evidently having stayed near it to listen in on Chase's "conversation" with Marshall. When he heard the sound of choking, he finally opened the door, only to freeze up in horror at the sight of Chase choking out one of his fellow pups.

"STOP IT! STOP IT, I SAID!" Ryder roared, charging forward and snatching Chase up, forcing his grip off of Marshall, who coughed as he felt precious air reentering his lungs.

Marshall barely reacted to anything going on around him as he focused on trying to get his breath back. If he'd stopped to look on, he'd notice that Ryder had set Chase back down on the ground, giving him a look of disgusted fury.

"HOW COULD YOU?!" Ryder yelled, before turning his attention back to the gasping dalmatian.

"Marshall, are you OK?" Ryder asked gently, placing his hands comfortingly on either side of Marshall's head, gazing into his eyes with worry.

"I… I… I'm a little shaken up, but I'll be OK..." Marshall stammered between breaths.

"You sure? Not in any more pain?"

"I'll be fine… It… it'll heal."

"Say something if something doesn't feel right, OK?"

"Yeah… will do..."

Ryder gave Marshall a comforting neck rub before slowly getting up, his face turning to a rare expression of fury and whipping around to Chase, who had run off to the corner and lay facing away from Marshall and Ryder. If they had paid any attention to him, they would have noticed Chase's actions hitting him like a ton of bricks, his eyes going wide and a paw going over his mouth before he ran off to the corner, practically hyperventilating.

"Chase…" Ryder began. "You'd better have a very, VERY good explanation for that."

Perhaps the most terrifying thing was that Ryder was no longer shouting. Ryder was talking at a very normal volume and tone. But it didn't take a genius to know that the boy was, for the first time in a very long time, utterly incensed. Chase still had yet to reply.

"Well?!"

"...n't..." Chase squeaked at a barely-audible volume.

"What was that?" Ryder asked in the same calm, yet enraged tone.

"...id… n't..."

Ryder leaned in, his anger having not subsided. "I can't hear you."

"I SAID I DON'T!" Chase finally screamed, still not looking at Ryder. Now Chase had undergone yet another sharp change in personality. Now he sounded scared. Regretful. Almost immediately the target of his anger had changed from Marshall to himself.

"What… what have I done… WHAT HAVE I DONE?!" Chase had begun to shake. "No! No, no, no! How could I have done that?! I just attacked someone for no reason! I'm a horrible pup! I don't deserve to be on the team! I'm a terrible leader! I… I… I'M A MONSTER!"

Ryder sighed so hard at Chase's sudden mood swing that it was slightly surprising that he didn't move anything in the room with the force of it.

"Marshall… I'll be back in a few… I think I need to have a talk with Chase… ALONE." Ryder sternly took the quaking shepherd in his arms and moved unflinchingly to the elevator, presumably to take Chase to his room to talk in private. All while Marshall watched on, wide-eyed.

The time was a blur for Marshall from that point on. Getting his breath back didn't take long, but trying to comprehend what went on took an eternity. Chase screaming in his face like an enraged beast? Chase choking him out? Ryder becoming utterly furious? No matter how he tried to fit the pieces together, they simply didn't stick. The other pups, of course, ran in after the shouting match to see what went on and if Marshall was OK, but their presence only stressed him out further. They left, but not without Skye issuing the condition that Marshall told them everything later. After what seemed like an eternity had passed, Ryder sauntered back into the room with a blank look on his face, carrying his Pup Pad with him.

"So? What did he say?" Marshall immediately asked. Ryder remained quiet until he reached Marshall's pet bed and sat cross-legged in front of it.

"Aside from putting himself down and trying to turn in his Pup Tag on the spot?" Ryder replied quietly, causing Marshall to look down in sadness.

"He told me that he was really angry. Like, more than he'd ever been. I asked him why and he just said that… he was worried."

Marshall looked back up. "...'worried'?" he echoed, cocking his head.

"He said that when that rubble hit you in the head, it scared him worse than… well, any time before." Ryder was struggling to explain. After all, he was struggling to comprehend these matters, too. "You know how protective Chase is, right?"

"Well… yeah, but..."

"He said that it felt like you didn't care. You probably could've died, and he felt like you didn't take anything seriously."

Marshall felt guilt punch him in the stomach. He was starting to feel incredibly stupid for taking such a life-threatening risk. Not once had he considered how the team's chief worrywart would take something like this.

"Ryder, sir…" Marshall whispered, looking sadly down at the floor. "...this… this is all my fault... isn't it?"

Ryder emitted yet another sigh, reaching over and reassuringly scratching Marshall behind the ear.

"Marshall… look at it this way. What you did was dangerous, and, yeah, pretty dumb. There were other ways we could've helped Alex than running in like that. You scared us all, not just Chase."

Marshall let off a guilty whine.

"But that does not, I repeat, does NOT give Chase the right to attack you like that." Ryder continued firmly. "I know he worries about all of you, and him yelling at you doesn't surprise me that much. But fighting you? Choking you? That's where Chase crossed the line."

Marshall looked up at Ryder. "Please don't punish Chase for this..." he pled.

At that moment, Marshall wanted nothing more than to find Chase, hug his brains out, apologise for scaring him so badly and tell him that he forgave him.

"I won't." Ryder replied. "But on one condition."

"'Condition'?"

"Chase has to make up with you. When I send him in, he needs to apologise and smooth things over with you. I'll only punish him if he can't do that."

Marshall looked down again. "...I see..." he whispered guiltily.

"But the problem is, it looks like he doesn't think he can. He kept saying that he doesn't deserve to even be around you anymore. And 'how can he be friends with someone he choked out?'."

Marshall began to feel even worse. Chase may have overreacted, but Marshall still cursed himself for not seeing his reaction coming. He hated seeing Chase worried, but he still felt heavily responsible for causing his worry-induced meltdown.

"But… I forgive him…" Marshall squeaked. "He… he wasn't himself when he did that, right?"

"No. No he wasn't." Ryder sharply concurred. "That wasn't the Chase we knew. And I think he knows that. You've gotta tell him that, too."

A heavy silence passed through the room, taking a couple of seconds before Marshall spoke up again. "...do YOU think I can make up with him, Ryder?"

"If I know you two? Then yes." Ryder replied with utmost confidence. "You two have fought before and you're still really good friends. It's on you to make sure this is no different. But I know you can make up with him."

"You do?"

"Can you hold a grudge, Marshall?"

Marshall's head snapped back up. "Of course I can't!" he shot back.

Ryder smirked. "Well, there you go."

After some more quiet reassurance, Ryder finally got up and departed again, heading for the door, Pup Pad in hand. A few seconds later, the elevator ascended and descended once more, this time with Chase as its passenger. Chase, however, kept his eyes firmly glued to the floor as he very slowly sauntered to Marshall's pet bed. Marshall couldn't quite see Chase's expression, but he got the feeling it wasn't anything good. Still without looking in the dalmatian's direction, Chase gingerly laid down, still having an apparent staring contest with the floor.

"Hi… er, Chase..." Marshall stammered, trying to get a conversation rolling however he could. But it was as if he was talking to a statue. Chase didn't reply at all.

"Chase?" Marshall repeated.

After a pause, Chase, while still not moving, finally began to speak. "Marshall… There's… there's no excuse… I… I am so, so, so, SO sorry for getting like that..."

It sounded like Chase was desperately trying to keep his emotions in check. His voice was flat, but at the same time, heavily strained. Like his emotional state was a mere poke away from toppling like a tree.

"I know… there's no way you could ever forgive me for choking you out… I d-don't even deserve to be a m-member of the Paw Patrol after that… A-and I'm a selfish, horrible, EVIL pup…"

Marshall couldn't help but notice the tears dripping from Chase's eyes, as much as he tried to hide it. His tone had changed to match, becoming distraught and regretful, self-hatred radiating from every word.

"But all I can say is… I-I'm s-sorry… Even though… it's not gonna be enough this time…"

Marshall had decided that he'd heard enough.

"I-I… I know... I'll n-never… NEVER make up… for attacking-"

Chase didn't get to complete his sentence as Marshall lunged forward and chomped down on Chase's collar. Chase expected as much, and closed his eyes in preparation for a retaliatory mauling. But the last thing the shepherd expected was for Marshall to forcefully yank him into the bed as hard as possible, catching him in a hug tight enough to practically break his spine. Chase's eyes shot open in disbelief, his mouth hanging open.

"Chase… You talk too much." Marshall whispered lightheartedly.

"Y-you forgive me?! H-how?!" Chase stuttered in shock, continuing to cry as he lay limply in Marshall's arms. "I-I thought you'd hate me! You should be terrified!"

"You know me, Chase. I can't hate anyone. Least of all you."

"B-but… You should! Marshall, I CHOKED YOU!" Chase screamed, voice wracked with despondent regret. "I attacked you! I swore to myself I'd never get violent like that! And I completely b-broke that promise!"

"No you didn't." Marshall firmly replied, squeezing Chase tightly. "The angry Chase earlier did. You obviously weren't in your right mind when you did that."

"R-right mind or not, it was still me! I completely lost it! I-I don't deserve… to be a member of the team… w-when I attack my teammates!"

"Chase, we aren't gonna throw you out for one mistake. We don't throw each other out for messing up."

"None of you have choked each other, though! I deserve to be thrown out! I don't deserve any of you! What kind of police pup goes around hurting his friends?! Can I even call you my friend after that?!"

Chase's guilty crying had only gotten louder. "I… I… I'm a terribl-"

"Chase, stop it, will you?!" Marshall barked, having had enough of Chase's self-castigation. "I. Forgive. You. And whether you think you deserve it or not, it's high time you did the same thing."

"But-!" Chase sobbed.

"Sorry, my mind's made up." Marshall interrupted again. "Whether you like it or not, I forgive you. I still love you. I'll tell you as many times as I've gotta."

Chase sniffled and sobbed. "Marshall-"

"Before you say anything else, you've gotta calm down. Stop tearing yourself apart. Just take some deep breaths."

A small pause ensued while Chase continued to cry. "I-"

"No more talk. Just breathe."

The two pups were always close. To the extent that some would dare to refer to them as brothers in all but name. Part of the reason for it is that they were always there for each other when they were feeling downcast or angry. And now was no different. Chase's anger-laden, guilt-filled sobbing continued unabated for at least three minutes before he slowly, but surely began to calm back down, his hatred for himself losing the battle against Marshall's warm reassurance, as the dalmatian had been nuzzling the shepherd and rubbing his back the whole while. After Chase had fallen completely quiet, save for the occasional sniffle and hiccup, Marshall finally began to speak once more.

"Better?" Marshall whispered gently.

"...kinda..." Chase replied quietly, his voice reduced to a hoarse whisper.

"So… You were worried?"

"Well… yeah…"

"About losing me?"

A long pause ensued. Marshall was about to speak again before Chase said something that he wasn't quite expecting.

"...I know."

Marshall blinked. "Huh?"

"I know… you think I'm overprotective… You think I'm stubborn… But… I thought… you'd actually… died on us this time..."

"Yeah… Ryder said." Marshall whispered guiltily. He was about to apologise until Chase spoke up once more.

"...you know I have nightmares about losing you guys, right?"

Marshall went rigid. "...wha?"  
"Please, Marshall, don't act so shocked." Chase pled. "I really do dream about you all dying sometimes… You burning to death… Skye crashing… Rubble… getting crushed…" Chase started to sniffle and whimper again, finally returning Marshall's hug, desperately clinging to his friend. "...Zuma… drowning… Rocky's… machines… blowing up… Heck, even… even Ryder falling to his death!"

"Chase..." Marshall whispered in horror, his eyes widening and flushing with tears.

Now everything was starting to make sense. Chase never really showed it, but he was truly scared for his teammates. Marshall knew he was a worrywart, but he never thought that it went this far. But any chewing-out Marshall was to give Chase for hiding his emotions would have to wait as Chase continued to pour out his heart.

"So… when that rubble… came down and hit you… It felt like those awful dreams had come true! It felt like now we'd really lost you!" Marshall couldn't see his face, but Chase was obviously bawling again. "And… and it felt like… you didn't even care! It felt like you didn't mind dying at all! That's why I got so angry! And… and did… THAT!"

Now it was Marshall's turn to break down crying in guilt. "Chase, I… I had no idea… I'm so sorry!" Marshall sobbed, Chase's despair spreading to him like a virus.

"Marshall, I-! I… I… I-I…" Chase stammered tearfully, before letting his emotions out in a deafening yell. "I CAN'T LOSE YOU! PLEASE!"

"I-I'm not gonna let that happen! I swear! N-Never!" Marshall wept, continuing to squeeze Chase for dear life. "I-I didn't realise you were so scared of losing us!"

A few minutes passed of the two pups crying into each other's fur, trying to calm down enough to find the words to speak again.

"Promise… promise you'll never do something that dangerous again! Please!" Chase begged while continuing to cry. "P-please say… you'll never risk your life like that!"

"Chase…" Marshall sobbed. "I-I can't say that we're not gonna do something... really dangerous… That's just the job…"

Marshall tightened his grip on the shepherd, his voice becoming more determined.

"But I swear… I won't jump in like that again… I won't throw myself into danger... I'll stay with you… W-We'll all figure something out as a team… C-cross my heart and h-"

Marshall quickly stopped himself, realising how that sentence ended and how Chase got like this in first place.

"Well, y'know." Marshall concluded lightheartedly through his tears.

Almost as if by magic, Chase quickly managed to calm down. He continued to whimper and sob, but now it was far more muted. As much as he clung to Marshall for dear life, Chase's breathing became more steady, even as he kept weeping.

"Thank you…" Chase whispered tearfully. "Marshall… Thank… you..."

There was no doubt in Marshall's mind that he'd managed to fufill Ryder's conditions beautifully. A huge smile spread across the dalmatian's face as he continued to hold Chase in his arms. And Chase, for his part, finally felt at peace, knowing that his fit of volcanic rage was forgiven, and Marshall had sworn to keep himself safe. After all, Marshall was a tremendously-poor liar.

A few minutes of holding each other close later, Chase finally stirred within Marshall's arms, pulling back to look the red-eyed dalmatian in the face.

"Chase?" Marshall whispered.

Despite Chase's coat being soaked with tears and his eyes being red and puffy, Chase still had a sad smile on his face.

"I… I always was kind of a crybaby about this kinda thing, wasn't I?" he croaked, his voice having been destroyed by the crying and yelling he was doing.

"Hey, it's nothing. Really. Heck, I should've realised you worried that much."

"I know we're all confident about what we can all do…" Chase averted his gaze, looking down at the floor sadly. "But I can never shake that feeling..."

"If it makes you feel better, when things get dangerous, I worry about us, too." Marshall retorted, causing a smile to return to the shepherd's face.

"Heh… Another thing we have in common..." Chase muttered ruefully.

Marshall closed in again, reassuringly nuzzling the shepherd. "I'll make sure I stay safe if you do. I've got your back if you've got mine."

Chase was quick to return the favour. "Always, Marshall. Always."

A few seconds later, the pups had yet to stop hugging each other, but this didn't stop Ryder from walking in with a proud smile on his face, kneeling down and pulling the two pups into his arms, turning their embrace into a three-way group hug.

"I told you." Ryder whispered sincerely. "I said you'd be able to make up."

"Yep." Marshall replied without missing a beat. "And now we both know better."

"I still kinda can't believe Marshall forgives me..." Chase mused quietly.

"How many times have I said it, Chase?" Ryder asked. "Marshall can't hold a grudge."

"Not even against Sid Swashbuckle, if you'd believe it." Marshall added, earning amused laughter from the other two parties.

"Well, anyway…" Ryder said after a pause. "You both think everything's OK now?"

"...yeah..." Chase whispered, more calmly than ever. "I think… I think it's gonna be fine."

"Well if Chase thinks so, then so do I." Marshall added breezily.

Ryder couldn't help but squeeze his pups even more tightly. Pride overflowed from the boy as he whispered to the pair of them.

"You're both such good pups… No matter what you think of yourselves..."

* * *

**_Whew... long one. And if you'd believe it, it's not the longest fic I have in store. That honour goes to next week's fic, which will also be the final one. Yep, Sunday's story will be the penultimate fic in this collection, with the last one being uploaded next Wednesday, as ever. This fic in particular, however, was my favourite of the lot. I only hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I did writing it._**

**_I feel like after a one-shot with as much intensity as this one, Sunday's fic should be one to help with cooling down from it. So Sunday's fic is basically going to be fluff and virtually nothing else. But it will contain a rather interesting diversion. The summary below should help clue you in. Thanks for listening, and see you Sunday._**

* * *

_**MOVIE NIGHT**_

**After a long series of rescues, Chase has been left exhausted and grouchy, unwilling to play with anyone. So Ryder hatches a plan to leave the overworked pup with Marshall to finally get some time to relax. And Marshall can't think of anything better to do than watch a movie to unwind, leading them to sit down and watch the most recent Apollo movie together.**


	6. Movie Night

_**MOVIE NIGHT**_

**After a long series of rescues, Chase has been left exhausted and grouchy, unwilling to play with anyone. So Ryder hatches a plan to leave the overworked pup with Marshall to finally get some time to relax. And Marshall can't think of anything better to do than watch a movie to unwind, leading them to sit down and watch the most recent Apollo movie together.**

* * *

It was a rare moment that Chase and Marshall got some time to themselves. The Lookout was usually jumping with the activities of the other pups, but now, for reasons unbeknownst to Chase, Ryder had taken the the other pups on a rescue, leaving Marshall and himself behind. Chase was obviously disappointed, but in truth, Chase's workaholism was really starting to show. Being called on near-constantly meant that Chase had not gotten a great deal of rest for a couple of days thanks to a spike in rescue activity.

To this end, Ryder had made a plan. He'd take all of the other pups and leave Marshall alone with Chase at the Lookout to try and get him to unwind a little. After some discussion, Marshall had come up with the idea of seeing a movie together. Chase was frequently drowsy and groggy, so anything involving exertion would likely not only make him feel worse, but make his newly-acquired grouchy temperament even worse.

Marshall had started to set up the TV area for the pair of them, placing a pair of cushions in front of the TV and pushing two bowls full of treats into the middle of the room. In the corner were a pair of blankets for in case they got sleepy. And as if on cue, Chase finally entered the room from performing a cautionary sweep of the Lookout. Sadly, with increased tiredness came increased paranoia for the shepherd.

"Well, it's all good around the Lookout. Everything's A-OK." Chase said.

"Great, that means there won't be any interruptions for movie night!" Marshall cheerfully replied.

Chase gritted his teeth and forced a smile, thinking that there were better things to be doing than watching a movie. "Yeah… great..."

"So what do you think we should watch?"

"I don't know. What about you?"

"Hey, I don't know either! That's why I asked you!"

"This is already off to a good start..." Chase scoffed with rolled eyes.

"Ugh, grumpy pup… I'll figure out something, I guess."

Chase dragged himself to a cushion and reluctantly dropped down onto it. "This oughta be good."

Marshall took hold of the TV's remote and started scanning through the options after settling down. Not many of them were anything new or interesting, and a lot of them were movies they had seen before, thanks in no small part to Rubble-led binge sessions of Apollo movies. Of course, when Ryder had picked a movie seemingly about a boy growing up with a family of dogs, it ended in bittersweet tragedy and the entire group being reduced to ungraceful tears, so Rubble was considered the safest bet for picking movies. Until Marshall happened across an unfamiliar-looking cover with Apollo the Super Pup emblazoned on it.

"Hey, this one looks good." Marshall observed. "Apollo vs. the Super Snatchers."

"Don't think any of us have seen that one yet." Chase replied, realising that the movie was still relatively new.

"Then we'll just watch the spoilers around the others."

Chase rolled his eyes again. "Whatever..."

"(Jeez. Hope this makes him loosen up a little.)" Marshall thought.

"Well, here goes!" Marshall selected the movie, and laid down to watch it, eager to see what it might bring.

* * *

_The movie had started out as expected. Apollo flying around, fighting off the Spider King, stopping thieves and saving the day as he usually did. Until all of a sudden, a woman's cry for help reached Apollo's ears._

"_Oh, Apollo! Thank goodness! You have to help me! I- I don't know what to do! Please!" The woman wailed._

"_Don't worry, ma'am, help is here." Apollo reassured the woman. "Now, what seems to be the problem?"_

"_I-it's my boy!" The woman replied. "He… H-he… He's not answering me! He's not doing anything! He's… just standing around!"_

"'_Standing around'?" Apollo echoed. "Can I see him?"_

_The woman had taken Apollo up to her son's room, but upon opening the door, she revealed what was essentially the husk of a boy, who was standing there and breathing heavily, with an empty stare adorning his face, looking straight ahead, not reacting to anything. Physically alive. Mentally dead._

* * *

"Whoa… that guy looks like a zombie..." Marshall observed.

"How did this go from thieves to zombies?!" Chase asked incredulously.

* * *

_It wasn't long before the scene changed from Apollo calling for his recently-introduced young ward, Mars, to a young girl playing with her toys in her back yard. The little girl seemed perfectly happy, unaware that there was a cloaked figure watching her from behind her shed, with a long, black trenchcoat, a top hat adorning its head and cat ears poking out from the sides of its hat. Slowly, it slunk out of the shadows, approaching the girl._

"_Hello, my pretty." The figure purred, getting the girl's attention._

"_Hm? Who are you?" The girl replied, looking up at the figure._

"_Just a passerby." The figure seemed to leer at the girl's dolls. "You have some very nice toys here, don't you?"_

"_My mommy says that I shouldn't talk to strangers." The girl was growing slightly concerned._

"_Now, now..." The voice soothed, with a quality almost like silk. "I'm not going to hurt you. I'm just interested in your toys, that's all."_

"_B-but… they're mine..."_

"_Oh, of course they are… But there's something else you have… something that interests me far more._

"_Wh-what?"_

_The figure slowly looked up, revealing a pair of blank, white eyes. Its hands began to emit a bright, purple glow._

"_Your SOLE possession, my dear." The figure replied, flashing a sick, toothy grin._

_Holding its hands out in front of it, the figure's hands glowed even brighter while the girl simply stood there in a trance, transfixed by the magic the figure was emitting. Soon, a white light slowly began to be pulled from the girl and into the figure's glowing hands._

* * *

"Wait. He's stealing her SOUL?!" Marshall gasped with a horrified expression, managing to put two and two together.

"Soul? Th-that's not scary. Th-that's ridiculous!" Chase stammered, trying to pretend that he wasn't seeing what he thought he was.

* * *

_More time had passed, and the scene had changed to a dark, abandoned, rat-eaten warehouse. Within, two figures were surrounded by large, colourful gemstones. Now without the darkness covering them, the two were revealed to be a pair of cats, one white and one orange, clad in the same garb as the figure from earlier, and both having a pair of blank, white eyes._

"_How long must we wait, Captain Mason?" the brown cat asked. "I'm so tired of waiting. Can't we just crush Apollo and move on this worthless city now?"_

"_Where have you left your patience, Payne?" the white cat asked in return. "You have been griping about the pace of our plans for an age, now. The time is near. You know we must await Smalls' return before we make our next move."_

"_The time has been near for months, now! I signed on for world domination, not waiting! Why, I would have been able to conquer this city five times over by now!"_

"_Oh, Payne..." a smooth voice interrupted. "...ever the impatient one."_

_The figure from earlier had stepped into the scene, finally revealed to be a black cat._

"_At long last!" Payne cried. "Did you stop to catch some mice on your way back here, Smalls?! We did NOT sign on to sightsee!"_

"_You could say that I stopped to catch some… larger mice." Smalls purred, unveiling the soul that he had taken from the little girl. "And this." He put the soul away to unveil a large, orange gemstone from his trenchcoat._

"_Ah, the final gem!" Mason declared. "Excellent work, Smalls! Now our plan can finally go into motion!"_

"_The city shall be OURS!" Payne screeched with a psychotic cackle._

"_At long last..." Smalls said calmly._

* * *

"I guess the Super Snatchers are stealing those gems to try and… control the souls they've stolen?" Chase theorised with a quizzical expression.

"Maybe." Marshall replied with a shrug. "I guess we'll have to wait and see."

"That's gotta be what they're doing!"

"Chase. Detective skills in movies. Remember?" Marshall cautioned, bringing back to mind the times of Chase spoiling movies for them by accident with his detective skills. Chase paused, huffed at the reminder, and laid his head back down with a glare.

* * *

_The movie went on for some time as Apollo and Mars investigated. But it didn't take long for Apollo to find the warehouse that the Super Snatchers had inhabited. But for the time being, they were completely alone._

"_I don't like this, Apollo..." Mars whined. "It's scary..."_

"_There's nothing to fear, Mars, old chum." Apollo reassured. "As long as we're together, nothing can stop us!"_

_Suddenly, a light turned on above Apollo, freezing him in place and confirming the nagging doubt that they may have been being watched. From out of the darkness stepped two of the Super Snatchers: Smalls and Payne._

"_At last… the famous Apollo the Super Pup..." purred the voice of Smalls._

"_And a kid?" Payne sneered. "Can't even do your own dirty work, huh?"_

"_Maybe not..." Apollo began, putting a paw on Mars' back. "But that's why Mars is with me! We're a team! And we're here to bring the Super Snatchers down!"_

"_Psh!" Payne scoffed nastily._

"_Always the optimist, yes?" Smalls replied. "Either way. Whether you're together or apart, in the end, the Super Snatchers will steal this very city. And it starts with getting rid of you. Let's go, Payne."_

_The two cats took a fighting stance and charged the two dogs, the pair taking their own stances and taking to fighting them, two-on two._

* * *

"Yeah! Get 'em, Apollo!" Marshall cheered, heavily invested in the film.

"Hey, this is getting good..." Chase muttered, the fight choreography striking a note with the shepherd.

* * *

_The fight raged for a few minutes with the dogs appearing to get the upper hand. But it didn't take long for things to radically change, as Mars soon found himself paralysed from the neck-down in a solid block of green slime._

* * *

"Oh, no!" Marshall cried.

"Whoa..." Chase mumbled, caught by surprise.

* * *

"_Mars, no!" Apollo shouted._

"_Aargh! Ugh! Apollo! Help… me!" Mars yelled, struggling futilely against the green slime._

"_I wouldn't do that if I were you..." another voice sang liltingly. Apollo looked around at his surroundings to see the ringleader, Mason, staring down at him from a scissor lift, putting away a futuristic-looking pistol._

"_You!" Apollo yelled. "What have you done to him?!"_

"_Oh, not much..." Mason sneered. "He's just in a bit of a sticky situation. He won't be hurt… well, until we take his soul, too."_

"_You won't get away with this!"_

"_I think we will. And besides..." The white cat reached down and pressed a series of buttons. "You're not the only one with help..."_

_A series of colourful gems dotted around the warehouse lit up one by one, until the doors to the warehouse swung open to reveal a horrific sight._

* * *

"Aaagh! What the heck?!" Marshall screamed.

"F-F-Freaky..." Chase stammered to himself, caught off-guard at how creepy the sight was.

* * *

_The sight was an army of everyday people. All stood staring emptily at Apollo and breathing heavily. All of them were clearly the victims of the Super Snatchers' soul-stealing powers._

"_No..." Apollo whispered in horror._

"_Seize him..." Mason calmly, yet smugly ordered._

"_SEIZE… SEIZE… SEIZE… SEIZE..." the mob chanted, slowly shambling towards Apollo. Frantically, the white dog hopped around in a bid to escape the grasp of the mob, while also trying to avoid the attacks of the two remaining Super Snatchers._

* * *

"Oh, no! Apollo!" Marshall cried out in fear.

"...don't lose, Apollo..." Chase whispered with wide eyes, unable to take his attention away from the screen.

* * *

"_People! What are you doing?!" Apollo yelled. "Why are you following the orders of this thief?! I'm not your enemy here!"_

"_SEIZE… SEIZE… SEIZE… SEIZE..." the mob continued, evidently not listening to Apollo._

"_They won't listen to you, you know." Mason taunted. "They only listen to the holder of the seven Soul Gems. That is: me. You may as well just lie down and let them take you. Just like we took your friend..."_

"_I'll never give up!" Apollo defiantly yelled. "Not to you!"_

"_Then we'll just make you."_

_At that moment, Apollo started to struggle to fight off the encroaching mob, as they grabbed onto his limbs. With each person, he struggled more and more to stay standing, until he eventually found himself being restrained with a person holding on to each one of his limbs. He struggled and pulled, but simply could not get free. To make matters worse, the camera had moved to Apollo's perspective, and it was soon filled by a closeup of a citizen missing their soul, who screamed straight into the camera._

* * *

"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUGH!"

Both pups had covered their eyes in fright, shaking violently. The scene had scared them practically straight out of their fur. As Marshall got a hold of himself, though, he realised something. He looked over at Chase, who uncovered one of his eyes to see the astonished look Marshall was giving him. Quickly realising what was going on, Chase swiftly sat back up with a forced expression of neutrality.

"...err, uh, ahem, er… I mean… I-I wasn't scared." Chase quickly stammered in a bid to save face.

"Uh-huh. Sure." Marshall replied flatly, not buying into a second of it.

Chase slammed his paw into the floor. "I wasn't!" he huffed with a childish pout.

"You're shaking like a leaf!"

"I-I'm cold!" Chase stammered, obviously lying through his teeth.

"And the scream?"

"I s-sneezed!"

"Chase, you're not sick and it's broiling hot tonight. You're as bad of a liar as me."

Chase turned back to the movie with an embarrassed pout. "(Ugh! He got me!)" he thought.

"(Ha! Got him!)" Marshall thought with a smirk, before also turning back to the movie.

* * *

"_What… do you plan to do?!" Apollo growled, continuing to struggle. "Kill me?!"_

"'_Kill'?" Mason asked breezily. "No, no, no… That'd be way too wasteful… In fact… you have too much to give… Like your soul… So strong… So powerful… We'll take it!"_

_Slowly, Smalls began to walk towards the helpless Apollo, his hands glowing._

"_Welcome to the crew, Apollo." Smalls purred._

* * *

"Nooo…" Marshall whined, barely looking at the movie through his paws covering his eyes. "Oh, I can't watch!"

"C'mon, Marshall, h-he'll be fine." Chase stammered, trying to reassure Marshall as well as himself. "I-It's Apollo."

"Pleasepleasepleasepleaseplease..." Marshall whispered in fear.

* * *

_All seemed lost. Apollo was defeated and was about to have his soul stolen. Smalls stood a few feet away from Apollo, slowly extending his hands towards the dog. Apollo's gaze turned vacant._

"_LEAVE HIM ALONE!" a voice screamed._

* * *

"Mars!" Marshall cried joyfully, as the camera revealed that Mars had freed himself from his slimy prison.

"Mars..." Chase whispered, relief swiftly washing over him.

* * *

_And with a few swift strikes, Apollo was free, and Smalls was knocked out on the floor._

* * *

"YES!" Marshall screamed. "Ohhh, that was close!"

"...phew… intense..." Chase whispered, perhaps a little louder than he intended.

* * *

"_Mars, old chum..." Apollo sighed, standing back-to-back with his sidekick. "...whatever would I do without you?"_

"_I don't think I wanna know!" Mars replied. "But we've still got bad guy butt to kick!"_

"_You're right. Let's take down those gems!"_

"_NO!" Mason screamed. "THIS CANNOT BE! PAYNE! TAKE THE ARMY AND GET THEM BOTH!"_

"_Let's go, Mars!" Apollo cried as the two leapt into action._

* * *

"OH YEAH!" Marshall yelled, standing upright. "Go for it, Apollo!"

Now Chase had been fully drawn in. "Kick their butts!" Chase cried excitedly, now on all fours.

Soon the movie was over. The Soul Gems had been destroyed, the Super Snatchers had been thrown in jail, everyone got their souls back, and the day was officially saved, with the city holding a parade in honour of Apollo and Mars. Marshall and Chase stared on as the credits rolled.

"Whoa…" Marshall whispered. "That was a weird movie. Really good, though."

"Yeah… Yeah it was..." Chase quietly agreed. As much as Chase didn't want to admit it, he had a blast watching it. It was going to be tough to keep his mouth shut in regards to spoilers.

"Pretty scary, too. I didn't think the Super Snatchers would start trying to take people's souls! And when that one tried to take Apollo's soul! Urrggghh, that was so close!"

Chase had opened his mouth to agree, only to realise that he was being strung along for the ride, and quickly attempted to save face.

"Well I, er… It wasn't THAT scary..."

"Quit lying, Chase! You were scared stiff that one time!"

"What?! No I wasn't!"

"You were into it!"

"Not that much!"

"Says the one who cheered for Apollo with me!"

"Ugh, leave me alone, will you?!" Chase snapped, stomping his paws into the ground "The movie was good! Can we just leave it at that?!" In a huff, Chase dropped back down onto his cushion

"(Still grumpy as ever?! Ugh, great, what now?)" Marshall thought with a scowl. If Chase couldn't be brought out of his funk by this, what would?

But it was then that an evil thought worked its way into Marshall's mind as he remembered Ryder's way of cheering up a grouchy pup.

"(Hmm… Maybe if words won't work...)" he thought with an evil smirk.

Chase simply laid where he was, looking like he was doing his best to remain aloof. His gaze was fixed so far ahead that he didn't notice Marshall sneaking towards him. Nor did he notice Marshall reaching over and lightly scribbling a paw across his side until it was too late.

"Coochie coochie coo!" Marshall cooed.

Chase's reaction was immediate. The shepherd jumped at the sudden tickling. "ACK-!" Chase shrieked. "Hee hee hee hee hee hee hee! M-Ma… Marshall, what are you-?!"

"Cheering you up, of course!" Marshall replied cheerfully, swiftly moving to trap Chase underneath him and start to tickle his other side.

"S-stop-!" Chase giggled helplessly, desperately trying to wiggle out from underneath the dalmatian as his laughter became more uncontrollable. "Q-quit it, hee hee hee hee! KNOCK IT OFF! Ha ha ha ha ha!"

"Stop being such a grumpy pup and maybe I'll think about it!" Marshall teased, shifting to start attacking Chase's belly.

"I'm not- not- ha ha ha ha! NOT BEING GRUM- PFFFFT- EEEAHAHAHAHAHA!"

If there was one weakness that Chase had that he didn't like admitting, it's that he was extremely ticklish. And Marshall's abrupt torture was swiftly becoming unbearable.

"You're a terrible liar, Chase!"

"Y-you… Ha ha ha ha ha! You- ha ha ha ha! You silly pup!" Chase yelled, trying his best to force back his bubbly laughter.

"You're gonna have to speak uuuup!" Marshall sang mockingly, pawing at Chase's sensitive ribs and stomach.

"S-STOP IT, MARSHALL! HAHAHAHAHAHA! QU-QUIT TICKLING ME!" Chase screamed, his laughter upgrading to hysterics. "AHAHAHAHAHA! Y- YOU'RE- HAHAHAHA! YOU ARE SO DEAD! HAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Marshall slowed down slightly, not breaking his tight hold on the ticklish shepherd. "Now that's not very nice, Chase!" Marshall scolded with an exaggerated angry face, which soon turned into a wicked grin. "You know what Ryder says..."

"Hee hee hee hee! Wh-what?" Chase giggled, afraid of what was coming.

"Naughty pups get a visit from the Tickle Beast!" Marshall leapt at Chase with his best monster roar, kneading and scribbling at the brown-furred pup as quickly as he could. "Roooaaaaagghhh!"

"GAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! NOOOOOOOO! HAHAHAHAHA!" With a face like he'd just taken a mouthful of fish, Chase went completely insane with laughter, squirming and squealing in futility.

Chase was losing his mind, desperately trying to get out of Marshall's grip, and failing as his formidable levels of energy started to bleed out to nothing. But despite it, Chase's tail was wagging furiously. Marshall continued to give his best monster impression as he roared and snarled while tickling Chase all over. The shepherd couldn't stand it, but deep down, he was enjoying himself. It didn't feel a lot like torture. It just felt like a friend's playful tickling. The warm feeling in Chase's belly betrayed his words.

"PLEEEAASE! MARSHALL- HAHAHAHA! I-I'M SORR- EEEEHAHAHAHAHA!" Chase pleaded through his hysterical laughter.

"There is no more Marshall! There is only the Tickle Beast!" Marshall snarled, internally surprised at how quickly Chase was reduced from aloof huffing to desperately begging to be let go.

"HAHAHAHAHA! UNCLE!" Chase howled, tears streaming down his face. "U-UN- HAHAHAHA! UNCLE!"

"It is too late for you, pup! The Tickle Beast is hungry!" Marshall growled, lunging towards Chase's soft belly. "Raaagghh!"

"AAAAAAAIEEEEEEEE HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! NOOOO! PLEEASE! HAHAHAHAHA!" Chase squealed as Marshall pretended to eat him. "YOU- YOU HAHAHA- YOU WIN! I GIVE UP! HAHAHAHAHA!"

It was still amazing to Marshall how quickly Chase could be reduced from a tough pup to a ticklish little kid begging for mercy. Satisfied that Chase had been taught a lesson, Marshall let go, finishing Chase off with a swift lick to his stomach, causing him to convulse with laughter again for a split second. Chase spent a long time gasping for air, obviously worn down, before opening his mouth again.

"Mar… shall…" Chase gasped. "Don't… EVER… do… that… again!"

"C'mon!" Marshall playfully retorted. "You're smiling!"

It was true that Chase still had a wide smile on his face as much as he desperately tried to catch his breath. This time, there was no denying that he had fun.

"Well… yeah..." Chase finally conceded.

"So the Tickle Beast helped cheer you up at least!"

"Yeah… he did..."

A few seconds passed of Chase recovering. After a while, Chase lay on his cushion sleepily, with Marshall next to him. Marshall hoped that he was successful in ridding Chase of his grumpiness as he spoke again.

"Chase, you really need to have some more time for yourself." Marshall said. "Working until you're tired and cranky doesn't help anyone."

"But… I can't… abandon my duties..." Chase slurred, not looking at Marshall as he fought to keep himself awake.

"Ryder will understand. Talk to him. I'm sure he'll help you however he can."

Chase had to concede that Marshall had a point. "...yeah… you're right…" But this didn't stop him from having one thought on his mind. Vengeance. A wicked smirk spread across the shepherd's face. "But who's gonna help you?"

"Huh? What's that supposed-" Marshall froze up on the spot. He realised exactly what that was supposed to mean, tensing up and starting to shuffle away. "Oh, no. Don't you-"

But Chase wasn't having any of it, evidently having a second wind as he sprang up and leapt at the frightened dalmatian.

"YOU'RE UNDER ARREST!"

Marshall couldn't even react. In the blink of an eye, Chase had him pinned and was sneering evilly down at him.

"AGH! NO! PLEASE, ANYTHING BUT THAT!" Marshall screamed.

"Giving up already? Really?" Chase scoffed, staring down into Marshall's wide, terrified eyes.

"Please, not the tickling! I'm sorry!" Marshall frantically shook his head.

"You're saying you regret tickling me?"

"Yes!"

"Hmm…" Chase made an exaggerated showing out of looking like he was giving the idea of mercy serious consideration. "I guess I'll let you go, then..."

Marshall's face lit up. "Really?" he asked in quiet hopefulness.

"Hmmmmmmm…" Chase, of course, already knew his answer as he lunged for Marshall's stomach. "NAH!"

Ironically, Marshall was fine with tickling others, but couldn't stand being tickled himself. Immediately, the spotted pup exploded into hysterics. "BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! CH-CHASE! HAHAHA! NOOOOOO! HAHAHAHA!"

"Who's a widdle tickle pup? Who's a widdle tickle pup?" Chase cooed mockingly.

"SH-SHUT UP!" Marshall shrieked. "AHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

"What's that, widdle Marshie-warshie? I can't hear youuuuu…"

Ordinarily, Chase wouldn't be caught dead making a fool out of himself like this. But he knew the best ways of getting under a pup's skin, and a little baby talk was a small price to pay for getting ticklish revenge on Marshall.

"HAHAHAHA! I-I SA-HAHAHAHA! SAID SHUT U-HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Marshall could barely even complete his sentences for laughing so hard. And Chase's taunting wasn't helping at all, the baby talk turning his face a fine shade of red beneath his fur.

"Why's my squishy widdle Marshmawwow so wude?" Chase scolded mockingly. "You're getting extwa tickles for that!" The shepherd moved his paws to the squirming pup's side while leaning in and licking his soft belly.

"GAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! NO, PLEASE! I-I- HAHAHAHA! I'M SORR- EEEEHAHAHAHA!" Tears swiftly starting rolling down Marshall's face

"Then answer me, Marshmawwow! Who's a widdle tickle pup?"

"M-MEEEEEEEEE- HEE HEE HEE HEE HEE!" Marshall squealed in defeat. "I-I AM! AHAHAHAHAHA!"

"You sure are, Marshie-warshie! Tickle wickle wickle!" Chase had moved to rubbing his face up and down Marshall's tummy.

Strangely, it wasn't long before Marshall stopped fighting back altogether. He was lying there limply and simply letting it happen. As much as Marshall couldn't stand it, he actually liked being tickled. He was still convulsing sometimes, but wasn't making much of an effort to get free. Despite his begging, Marshall felt like he was laughing at an incredible joke.

"HAHAHAHAHA, D-DARN IT, CHASE! HAHAHAHA- S-STOP TICKLING ME! HAHAHAHAHAHA!" Marshall begged weakly.

"But your tail is wagging like crazy!" Chase observed in his normal voice with great amusement between licks and nuzzles. "You're loving this! Don't lie!"

Marshall's tail was indeed thrashing around violently behind him. But be that as it may, the pup was running out of air. "I-I CAN'T TAKE IT! HAHAHAHAHAHAHA! P-PLEASE, CHASE- HAHAHAHA! I-I'M GONNA EXPLODE! HAHAHAHAHAHA!"

"Oh, so you're saying I'm stronger than you?" Chase taunted. "You're saying you don't know how to pick your tickle fights? You're saying I win?"

"Y-YEEEEEEEESSSSS! AHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Satisfied with Marshall's answer, Chase finally let the speckled pup go, hopping off to Marshall's side and laying back down. The shepherd's energy had finally been entirely spent. As had Marshall's, who lay next to Chase gasping for breath. The spectre of sleep loomed large over the pair of them.

"Been… a while since we played like that… huh?" Chase sleepily asked, licking Marshall's cheek, repressing his disgust at the salty taste.

"Ahh… ahh… mmh-hmm..." Marshall wheezed, very slowly rolling onto his front.

"Pfft… You're more ticklish than I am, Marshall…" Chase taunted drowsily.

"Aghlo… Blughlaghiphruuuugh..." Marshall babbled, his brain turned to cheese by the tickle fight they shared.

"Ha ha ha…" Chase laughed quietly. "You can dish it… but you can't take it, huh?"

Marshall, being unable to speak, nodded, leaning his head towards Chase, who moved in closer to him in turn. Marshall's thoughts were as slippery as a bar of soap, but his one coherent thought was that it looked like he was successful at snapping Chase out of his doldrums. His plan with Ryder was a total success. Now they could both get a good night's sleep.

"Hey… Marshall?" Chase whispered, nuzzling Marshall while barely managing to stay awake. "Thanks so much for all of this… I feel… way better..."

Marshall felt his spirits lift enough to get one more intelligible sentence out before losing consciousness entirely. "I… I… I'm… glad I could… help..."

The Lookout fell quiet afterwards. The other pups, for their part, were too tired to do anything beyond eat dinner and go straight to bed on their return. But when Ryder went to check on Chase and Marshall, the boy's heart melted at the sight of his pups sleeping like babies. After draping one of the blankets over the pair of them, he couldn't resist taking a picture of the two. While studying the photo he just took, Ryder fondly whispered to himself.

"That's a keeper."

* * *

_**And now for something completely different. I thought that just a few sentences describing the movie that the two were watching would be boring, so, why not make it into a short story all its own? I thought that after the intensity of Eruption, that a fluffy fic of this pair playing would be a good antidote. Not that it seems like anyone really liked it, sadly. It's a good thing I pre-write all of my stories, or the fact that my favourite story bombed would prove to be a major blow to my motivation to finish this.**_

_**Anyway, this is your Official Penultimate Chapter Warning™. The next uploaded story will be the last one in this collection, and I'll say this: the genre is going to be a bit of a departure from what I usually write on this site. It'll be more of a fast-paced fic than normal, given the premise. This collection has had ups and downs (though primarily downs), and it'll come to an end on Wednesday, save for the Afterword, where my plans will be summed up for the near-future. Thanks for listening, and I hope to see you Wednesday. Here's the summary:**_

* * *

**_ULTIMATE DANGER_**

**Being the firefighter of the Paw Patrol has a lot that comes with the territory. One of these things being the sheer danger that you can get into. And when a forest fire breaks out, Marshall summons his courage to lead the team in putting out the blaze. But a rescue like this can have many twists and turns, even when he has Chase by his side all the way.**


	7. Ultimate Danger

**_ULTIMATE DANGER_**

**Being the firefighter of the Paw Patrol has a lot that comes with the territory. One of these things being the sheer danger that you can get into. And when a forest fire breaks out, Marshall summons his courage to lead the team in putting out the blaze. But a rescue like this can have many twists and turns, even when he has Chase by his side all the way.**

* * *

"How's it looking up there, Skye?" Marshall asked.

"There's only a couple of pockets of fire left, Marshall." Skye replied from the air. "One to the east and one to the west. You're coming up on the east one, now."

"Keep the west one in check. We'll be right there."

"Roger."

The Paw Patrol were used to dealing with small-scale disasters. From someone losing something important, to something going wrong that required specialist help. But when Ryder had put together the Ultimate Rescue vehicles, it was almost as if they were growing up, ready to take on much bigger problems.

But they weren't expecting something as deadly and destructive as a forest fire. The people of Adventure Bay had started to notice something off about the day when they saw a large, black, smoky plume rising into the sky. The day was already hotter than average, but Mayor Goodway, who'd headed to the forest for a picnic, had been the one to call the Paw Patrol in when she noticed the smell of something burning. Thankfully, one application of the Ultimate Fire Truck's claw courtesy of Rubble managed to get her and Chickaletta to safe ground, allowing the group to start tackling the fire.

The sky had been tinted a shade of orange and clogged up with smoke as the fire's crimson tendrils snaked through the once-peaceful forest. The scale of the disaster had frightened even Marshall, who was usually hard to faze when it came to the subject of fires. But the pup knew that he had to swallow his fear and step up in the face of extreme danger. And he was eternally grateful for the oxygen masks that Ryder had gone to the trouble of kitting them out with. So far, Skye had been dropping fire suppressant from the air while the rest of the team worked to contain the flames as best they could. And as of right now, it looked like the fire was going to be beaten before dinner time.

"Make this quick, everyone!" Marshall commanded. "We've still got another fire to put out! Rocky, Zuma, you take my left! Rubble, Ryder, take it from here! Chase, come with me!"

"Got it!" Everyone shouted as Marshall turned to head to the other side of the danger zone, with Chase following closely behind him.

"Pincer movement?" Chase asked.

"Yep."

Marshall always had a serious side to him. He may have been known as the fun-loving, clumsy joker of the team, but even he knew when things had gotten grim. He was the team's fire pup for a reason, and he knew when the time for joking had passed. And this was one such time. Not least because, being an Ultimate Rescue, he was in charge for a change.

Soon, he and Chase had arrived at the location of the fire, barked out their extinguishers, and set to work fighting the blaze. The two were on constant watch for anything going wrong as they sprayed down the raging inferno. The two had made good progress in fighting the fire, and Marshall was hopeful that they'd be able to move on to the final pocket of fire before long.

"Guys, water check." Marshall said over his Pup Tag.

"Still got plenty." Chase replied.

"I'm good here." Rocky added.

"Me too." Zuma added.

"I'm fine." Rubble added.

"Everything's fine here, too." Ryder added.

"Uhh..." The chain was soon broken by an uncertain voice.

"Skye? What's wrong?" Ryder asked on his line.

"Well, I've got enough suppressant, but I think I saw Danny in the fire!" Skye answered worriedly.

"WHAT?!" the team yelled.

"(Please, no...)" Marshall thought.

"I don't think he can get out!" Skye continued.

"Are you sure, Skye?" Marshall asked.

"Someone wearing yellow is in there, and it's not Rubble!" Skye squinted through her goggles in a bid to identify the obviously-human figure stuck in the raging fire. "He's wearing a helmet at least… And is that… some kinda scooter?"

"(It IS Danny…)" Marshall concluded to himself with great disappointment. "(That kid has a screw loose, I swear!)"

"How does he look?" Ryder asked.

"I can't really see. There's a lot of smoke, but I don't think he can get out!" Skye said.

"Urrrrrgh..." Marshall let off a long, annoyed groan.

"You said it..." Chase said.

"Marshall! We'll have to split up! One team has to save Danny!" Ryder instructed.

"Hold on, I just need to think..." Marshall froze, contorting his face into an expression of thought. As stupid as he was, a person in distress was still a person in distress. After a little while, Marshall thumped the ground with his paw.

"OK, got it!" Marshall declared. "Everyone stay here except Chase!"

"(Huh? Me?)" Chase thought in surprise.

"Skye! Keep doing what you're doing! Chase, come with me!" The dalmatian in red moved to leave the way he came. He and Chase had made enough of a dent in the fire for the others to mop up easily.

"Marshall, wait!" Ryder cried, stopping him. "I'm not so sure about that!"

"Ryder, sir! Do you trust me?"

"Wha-? Trust, I-"

"Do you?"

"Well, y-yes, but-"

"Then keep at it! We'll be back!"

A long silence ensued. It seemed that Ryder was very tempted to try and veto a plan that only involved the pair of them and no-one else. Marshall was in charge, but in the end, Ryder was the final arbiter of any decisions made. After the silence, an audible sigh came over Ryder's line.

"...OK, Marshall… BE. CAREFUL. Both of you."

"We will." Marshall replied, before turning back to the shepherd. "Chase, we'll take the mini-cart."

"Let's go!" Chase barked as the two charged towards the Ultimate Fire Truck.

While the truck was visible when Chase and Marshall finally arrived, Ryder and Rubble were not. Clearly, the two were still tackling the fire from their size. Hopefully they wouldn't keep them waiting too long. After a quick water refill, the two took off. Much to the two's dismay, they'd forgotten that the cart was a single-seater in their haste, forcing Chase to hold on to the back for dear life as Marshall drove them to the scene of the fire.

"So where are we going, Marshall?" Chase asked around the hose in his mouth.

"Simple." Marshall replied, moving to activate his Pup Tag. "We just follow the smoke." The pup soon established a connection to their eyes in the air.

"Skye, listen up. Me and Chase are on our way to get Danny out of there. Are we close to him?"

"Uhh…" Skye scanned the environment, and sure enough, saw a bright red cart moving towards the fire. Unfortunately, not the side that Danny was on. "No, Danny's on the other side in a clearing. But there's no way around to it." Skye decided that she'd ask about the shepherd gripping the hose in his mouth later on.

"Then we'll have to push through it, right?" Chase asked, his voice still muffled.

"You got it." Marshall replied.

Skye felt a pit in her stomach as she overheard the pair's conversation. It sounded suspiciously like a suicide mission to her. "Guys are you… sure about that?"

"Can you fly down and get him out of there?" Marshall asked bluntly. Skye recoiled a little at Marshall's question.

"What?! You realise I'm smaller than the pair of you, right?" Skye responded, unamused.

"Then we don't really have a choice, do we? Don't worry about us, just focus on making an opening in the fire for us, and we'll focus on getting Danny out!" Skye swallowed at Marshall's instructions, fearing the worst.

"R-roger..."

Orders were orders. Skye carefully lined herself up with the approaching cart and let another cloud of red powder loose from her Pup Pack. The spectacular sight soon disappeared, and the flames blocking their route flickered and sputtered.

"Nice! Good work, Skye! We can take the rescue from here!" Marshall praised. Skye, for her part, turned to keep flying and attacking the fire from above however she could, praying for the pair's safety.

"Alright, Marshall. Where do we start?" Chase asked, having finally let go of the hose.

"First, we've gotta make an opening. All that fire's gonna make it impossible for us to get to Danny in the first place. I'll use the cart's sprayer, you use your extinguisher."

"Roger."

Chase hopped down from the cart, rubbing his jaw.

"Ahhh… There's gotta be a less dangerous way of doing that..." Chase groused to himself, before stretching and shaking himself off.

"Ahem. Ruff! Extinguisher!"

Sure enough, the two pups hit the fire with a combined blast of water, making sure to get enough coverage to provide enough room to get the two of them through the trees.

"Stop!" Marshall cried after a few minutes as his stream of water ceased. Chase, for his part, quickly did the same.

"That should do it." The dalmatian continued.

"Now we've gotta get in there, right?" Chase asked, as Marshall approached.

"Right. Put your mask back on. It's really smoky in there."

Marshall moved to reapply his oxygen mask for the trip into the haze-covered inferno. Chase didn't wait to be asked twice. Marshall and Ryder both had been quite vocal about the effects of smoke inhalation, and they'd even said that smoke is more dangerous than the fire it came from.

"Alright, I'm ready!" Chase declared after fixing his mask into place.

"Let's go!" Marshall barked, charging into the opening they'd just created with Chase close behind.

The forest was in a state unlike anything the pups had ever seen. All around them, fires were raging away, and even as they attempted to put out the fires in their way to move on ahead, the heat was immense and the smoke rendered it impossible to see anything. It was almost like a twisted depiction of the afterlife itself.

"Keep pushing! Straight ahead!" Marshall shouted.

"Marshall, watch out!" Chase yelled.

Marshall looked up to see a red-hot branch coming down on him. With a yelp, he leapt backwards to avoid getting pancaked by the burning lumber, and set his water cannons on it when he recovered.

"Whoa! Thanks!"

"I can't see anything! The smoke's really thick!" The only thing Chase could see was the shadow of a dalmatian moving in the smoke. He was only able to make out the falling branch from the shadow it cast as it approached the ground.

"Chase, behind you!" Marshall shouted. Chase whipped around to see a tree falling behind him, finally giving up from being burned too badly.

"Wuh-oh!" Chase yelped, leaping out of the way to avoid getting flattened.

"Just stick close!"

The two had been pushing forward and dodging falling debris for a couple of minutes. Growing concerned, Marshall made another call to Skye.

"Skye! How close are we?" Marshall asked.

"I don't know! I can't see you!" Skye replied, looking down at the cloud of smoke covering the air. "The smoke's too thick!"

"Crud… OK, just focus on the fire! Don't worry yourself about us! We'll be fine!"

"How can I not worry about you?! You're both in the middle of a big fire, and I'm starting to run a little low on water! Promise me you'll get out of there if things-"

"Hey! Anyone there?! Hello?!"

Marshall didn't hear any more of Skye's message as a shout cut through the smoky air.

"Huh? Was that Danny?" Chase asked.

"I think it was!" Marshall replied "Hello?! Danny?! Is that you?!"

"That's Daring Danny X!"

"Oh, whatever!" Marshall barked back indignantly, afraid his eyes might fall out of his skull from rolling them so hard. At least he had an answer to his question.

"What is this kid's major malfunction?!" Chase asked himself in annoyance.

"(Note to self: Ask Chase where he got that later!) Just hang on! We're coming!"

Running in the direction of the voice, the two finally came to a clearing. The scene was as Skye had described it. In front of the two was a scooter, heavily mangled from an obvious crash with some flaming debris. Not far away from it lay a large tree branch that currently lay atop Danny, looking as blasé as ever. It didn't take much of an imagination to figure out how the boy in yellow had gotten into that situation. He clearly saw the forest fire as a chance for some stunt riding. If the pups could concede one thing, it's that at least Danny was wearing a helmet.

"Danny! Are you injured?" Marshall asked.

"Whaddaya think, man?!" Danny replied with a cocky grin. "I still feel good! I could go for another!"

"(And Chase yells at US for getting into trouble?)" Marshall thought with an internal scoff.

"(And I yell at THEM for getting into trouble?)" Chase thought with an eye roll.

"Maybe hold off until AFTER the fire's been put out?" Chase suggested, holding back the urge to lecture the child's ears off.

"Stay still and we'll get this branch off you, OK?" Marshall said.

"I'm stayin'." Danny shrugged.

One quick application of water cannons later, the smouldering branch was safe to touch. Without the Ultimate Fire Truck's claw, however, they'd have to settle for trying to lift the branch themselves. Without thinking, the two moved to push the heavy branch off of the boy's body.

"Alright, Chase, push on three." Marshall instructed over his Pup Tag.

"Got it."

"...THREE!"

With Marshall's command, the pushed as hard as they could, slowly but surely moving the branch from the boy's back to his legs. Soon, it was only a matter of Danny working his feet free from the branch.

"Danny…! Move…!" Chase strained.

"Ugh… I'm- KOFF! KOFF! ...clear..." Danny coughed, doing as he was told and finally getting free from the branch, only to choke on the smoke as he got to his feet.

"Danny, get down!" Marshall yelled.

Again, Danny did as he was told, dropping down and lying on his belly. One of Marshall's instructions was that smoke rises, and if they find themselves with no mask, then get as low to the floor as possible to breathe in less of it. The mask-clad Marshall swiftly moved over to Danny, still grateful that the branch was light enough for the pair of them to move.

"Arf, arf! Oxygen mask!" Marshall barked, his call answered by a spare oxygen mask being produced from his Pup Pack. The arm holding it moved towards Danny.

"Here, take this, and don't take it off." Marshall instructed. "Put it over your mouth and nose." Danny did so. If there was anything to be grateful for, it's that he was at least capable of following instructions. Even if he did look like a sullen toddler as he did so.

"Alright. Head down that way and don't stop." Marshall gestured to the path they just carved with his paw. "Follow the trail we've made."

And for the first time, Danny didn't follow instructions. Instead he just stood there, looking back and forth at the trail that Marshall and Chase had painstakingly carved, and the mangled remnants of his scooter.

"Forget the scooter!" Chase snapped, finally losing his patience. "Your life's more important! Move your extreme butt!"

Defeated, Danny made towards the trail, looking thoroughly disappointed that he had to leave without his scooter. The two could only watch on in bewilderment. Even after all the times they had to save Danny, they still found themselves amazed that someone could have so little regard for their own life.

"He's gonna get himself killed one of these days..." Marshall mumbled, glaring.

"So are we if we don't get out of here!" Chase replied sharply, jolting Marshall back to reality.

"You're right. Move it! We'll meet up with the others when we're out of here!" Marshall commanded, not wasting any time as he and Chase made their way back the way they came.

At this point, it was basically a race against the clock. With most of the fires quenched, it was simply a matter of getting back to the entrance. As they ran, they saw no sign of Danny. They only prayed that he hadn't gotten distracted by the opportunity for more extreme stunts. Though as they ran, a loud crack rang out from beside them. A glance to the right revealed a large tree coming down right in the middle of the trail that they'd made.

"Whoa-!" Marshall yelped, leaping backwards.

"Look out!" Chase yelled simultaneously, doing the same as the tree impacted the ground with an almighty crash, barring their way through.

"We've gotta get over this thing!" Marshall said, shrugging off what just happened. "Help me put it out! Arf, arf! Water cannon!"

"Ruff! Extinguisher!"

The two set about extinguishing yet another burning tree that day. Fortunately for them, the tree had no shortage of climbable branches, and they were able to put it out in short order.

"That should do it!" Marshall declared.

"After you." Chase offered.

As much as Marshall would've loved to argue about Chase choosing to let him go first, he decided that it wasn't really the time for that. Instead, he just hoped that Chase was close behind him as he hopped up the branches and on top of the fallen tree. Marshall squinted, looking for a way down, before catching sight of some more branches. It wouldn't be easy, but Marshall was happy to take any option that didn't end in him breaking his legs.

But as Marshall moved to the branches, he failed to notice another tree falling on top of the extinguished one that he was walking on. The tree impacted the fallen one with an almighty crash.

"AGH-! Whoa-!" Try though he might, Marshall lost his balance entirely and fell to the floor below with a crash.

"Ugh!"

Marshall grumbled as he picked himself up. Perhaps the spirits of the forest were angry about the trees being on fire and had decided to take it out on him? Though as he breathed in, he began to hack up a lung from smoke scorching his airways. Freezing in place, he reached for his oxygen mask. But what greeted his paw was a shattered mass of plastic. Glancing over at where he fell, Marshall's worst fears were confirmed: his rough landing had smashed his oxygen mask. Perhaps his sole lifeline in this situation. Marshall couldn't stop himself from voicing his thoughts on the situation.

"Uh-oh!"

Marshall took a low stance in response while trying to keep himself calm. Even though Chase only took a couple of seconds to appear over the fallen tree, it felt like an eternity. Now Marshall was running the meter. He had to evacuate and evacuate fast.

"Marshall!" Chase cried, hopping down from the branches of the tree, landing heavily. "I- koff, koff-! My mask! I…" Chase froze as he got a good look at the remnants of Marshall's destroyed oxygen mask. Marshall got a similar expression of fright on his face as he saw that Chase's mask was damaged too. The second tree had to have jolted him off as he was climbing the branches.

"Oh, no..." Chase mumbled in fright.

"'Oh, no' is right! Khack!" Marshall spluttered. "This smoke… Is way too- koff... thick!"

"Stay low?" Chase asked, moving his head closer to the ground

"Stay low! Keep moving and keep your head down!"

"R-koff-roger!"

The race against the clock had just become doubly urgent. The pups had to move slower due to them trying to keep their heads down, but if they stayed in there too long, then the smoke inhalation would prove too much for them. They tried desperately to keep these thoughts confined to the backs of their heads as the pair moved as quickly as they could

"Urgh… koff… I'm feeling… khack, koff- woozy..." Chase coughed, his voice becoming scratchy.

"Don't- koff! Don't you- khack, urghk-! Give up on me..." Marshall hacked in return.

"Wasn't… planning to… ughack, koff, koff-!"

Smoke was a killer. That's what Marshall had always told them. And this killer was rapidly entering their lungs with every breath. Adrenaline was powerful, but the smoke was taking its toll on their bodies. Their running started to slow and the world began to spin around them. But the thought of being so close to the exit and their freedom kept the two going. And indeed, their way out was now staring the two directly in the face. With hope in their hearts, the two ran with all of their might. But even that was to be cruelly snatched away from them by the all-too-familiar loud crack overhead, followed by yet another huge, flaming branch falling in front of them.

"Agh-! Euhaghck! Koff-!" Marshall weakly choked.

"No! Koff, koff, urk-! We're… so close!" Chase spluttered feebly.

Marshall stomped his paw once again. "I did not… kaff- come this far… koff, koff- to choke to death on smoke!"

Chase gave a determined glare. "Neither… koff- did I!"

"Put it out… and… koff- push through it! Arf… water… cannon- koff, koff!"

"Ruff… extin- koff- guisher!"

The two were running out of time. The smoke was starting to get to be too much. It was as if a yawning black void was opening beneath them, and one misspent second would send them tumbling down. All that kept them going was grit. Worse is that there was no time to spend climbing over the branch once the fire was out, which itself felt like it took an eternity.

"Chase… kaff- push..." Marshall coughed.

The only way past the branch was through it at this point. With the last of their strength, the two pups charged into the jagged, tapered bark and what few leaves remained on the branch, pushing through it with all of their might. And as if by some miracle, as the sharp bark stopped tearing at their skin, the two staggered out of the flames, the relatively-clean air of the safe area scorching their lungs as they frantically crawled away from the fire.

The two lay on the floor side-by-side hacking and spluttering, but very much free. Their lungs were badly-scorched by the smoke, but there was now hope that they might be OK. Hope that intensified when they saw what Danny's jaw was hanging open about. The Ultimate Fire Truck, pulling towards them at an immense speed. Chase and Marshall exchanged a look between themselves, weakly lifting their paws and slapping them together.

"What a team..."

"What a team..."

And with these words, everything went dark.

Marshall soon slowly woke to find himself in an unfamiliar position. As weak as he still was, he realised that things were way quieter than they once were. He was eventually able to register that he was back in the Lookout. Only he was in Ryder's room, tucked into a comfortable bed and missing his gear. It took him a little longer to register that something was over his mouth and nose. He soon found the strength to move his head.

To his left, he noticed a pair of large, white cylinders with red valves atop them, each having a clear tube coming from it snaking their way across the bed. Looking at where they were going, he noticed something alarming to his right. It was Chase, passed out completely, missing his gear and with an oxygen mask over his face, the plastic tube of one of the cylinders connected to it. Marshall's thoughts were scattered all over the place, and he could only wonder what was going on.

"Ohhh… You're finally awake..." a voice, sighing heavily with relief, came from his left.

Marshall labouredly craned his neck in the direction of the voice to see that it belonged to a worried-looking Ryder, sat against the far wall.

"Ry… der… koff, koff..." Marshall croaked, only to be cut off by another coughing fit.

"Whoa, hey, don't push it. Just keep breathing. You guys took on a lot of smoke. You've gotta stay on that oxygen for a little while."

Marshall could only do as he was told, lying in the bed and taking deep, steady breaths in a bid to try and get more precious oxygen to his lungs, and to recover his lost energy. His body was slightly sore as well, the memory of pushing through the final branch coming back to him. Eventually, however, Chase awoke, too, and was just as confused and ailed as Marshall was. Ryder only told him what he'd told Marshall. Ryder looked haunted. Frightened. He spent most of the time they had together breathing deeply. After a few more minutes of recovery, Ryder began to explain.

"So I guess you're wondering what's going on?" Ryder asked, to nodding from both of the pups.

"Well, we took care of the fire and saw you both blacked out. We gave Danny a talking-to and sent him on his way and took you down to Katie's when the fire was out. Heh, Skye was pretty mad at you two for doing all of that, you know."

The two groaned. They forgot how Skye was essentially left high and dry as they found Danny while Marshall was listening to her message, and that she was already worried about the two of them as it was. She was going to slap the pair of them silly for scaring her. But there would be time for that later.

"Now, you're both pretty scratched up." Ryder went on. "But you'll live. The smoke inhalation was the worst part of it. So you both need to be on oxygen for a couple of hours."

Chase and Marshall shared a look between each other. A look of "Skye's going to kill us.".

"We'll talk more about it later, though. For now, though, just rest up."

Eventually, the pair were able to take off their masks, now breathing freely. They wouldn't be able to exert themselves for a while, but now they could breathe comfortably without coughing. And now it was Ryder's turn to ask them about what happened. Predictably, the boy wasn't happy with how much danger the two had put themselves in.

"So you both thought it'd be a good idea to go by yourselves into a huge fire to get Danny out?" Ryder asked, unimpressed.

"Hey, we needed you to focus on the fire back there!" Marshall defended.

"But you could've brought someone else!" Ryder countered.

"It wouldn't have made a difference, though!" Chase added.

"But he could've called us if things went wrong!" Ryder shot back.

"And then what, we leave the forest to burn?! Or should we have left Danny to burn?" Marshall asked sarcastically.

"But the two of you clearly weren't enough!" Ryder barked.

"Hey, we got a little unlucky! What else could the other pups have done?!" Chase replied with force, much to Marshall's surprise. "And we got Danny out, and got ourselves out, even though our equipment got busted! I dunno about you, but I'd call that a win!"

Ryder opened his mouth to argue back, but realising the futility of it, sighed heavily, dropped his head, and moved over to the bed, sitting down heavily on it and placing a hand on their heads.

"You two are crazy, you know that?"

"You've gotta be a little stupid sometimes, right?" Chase shrugged.

"Well… I guess..." Ryder found it difficult to find a rebuttal for a statement like that.

"Are you going to punish us for this?" Marshall asked. Ryder seemed to think it over for a few seconds before answering.

"...no, I don't think this is worth punishing you two over. I mean, yeah, you both scared me, and there were probably better ways of handling this. But you both did really well. You saved Danny and managed to get yourselves out of there alive."

Ryder rubbed their heads, causing them both to smile contentedly.

"You scared the heck out of me… But I'm proud of you both. Shrugging off the odds and putting other people first. That's what being the Paw Patrol is all about."

The two lay in the bed peacefully, enjoying Ryder's praise, grateful that their leader wasn't angry with them. Until Chase let out some dry coughs.

"Thirsty?" Ryder asked with a smile. The pups both nodded.

"Thought so. Sit tight. I'll go get you both some water." Patting their heads, Ryder got up from the bed and headed for the door, only to stop shy of it and turn back to the pups with a prideful smile.

"You both did a good job, today. I think you've both earned a nice, long rest."

The pups returned Ryder's smile as the boy made his exit. The two lay in an awkward silence for a while before Chase slowly turned his tired body towards Marshall.

"Hey, Marshall? I'm curious about something."

"What's that?" Marshall replied.

"Why did you only pick me to go with you to save Danny? I mean, you could've picked anyone else, but you picked me?"

"Well, I would've thought that was obvious. You're probably the toughest pup here. Who WOULDN'T want you with them when things get rough?"

"But… the other pups are tough too, you know?" Chase countered, giving Marshall a funny look. "I mean, not that I wouldn't want to be with you in tough times, but… Anyone else would've done, right?"

"Maybe. But we know each other too well, Chase." Marshall gave the shepherd a fond smile. "We've been on a lot of rescues together, you and me. You're strong, you're brave, and most important, you never give up no matter how bad things get. You stick with a pup until the very end. And when my tail's against the wall… well, I can't think of any other pup I'd want with me."

Chase jaw hung open slightly in response to the praise. "Marshall… thank you… that… really means a lot..."

"You'd do the same for me, right?"

"You know it." Chase smiled back at the dalmatian.

"Even though I'm clumsy?"

"Well, look at it this way, Marshall. Were you clumsy back when the forest was burning?"

"...I don't… think so?" Marshall had a degree of uncertainty to his voice.

"No, you weren't. You're clumsy, but when the chips are down, you're as dependable as they come."

Now it was Marshall's turn to be caught off-guard by sudden praise."...thank you, Chase… Thank you so much..."

"Hey." Chase held his paw out to the dalmatian. "We're unstoppable together, right, Marshall?"

Marshall reached over and held his paw against the shepherd's.

"Invincible, Chase."

The two smiled at each other, basking in the glow of a job well done. Despite the odds, together, they were as they described themselves. Unstoppable. Invincible. The two lay in silence, until Chase, surprisingly, broke the atmosphere.

"Well, we'd probably be way more invincible without the looming threat of fiery death."

And now that they were finally able to do so, the two burst out laughing uncontrollably.

* * *

**_Can you tell that this one was MEANT to be the very last thing I wrote before I went dormant? This is the first time I've ever written something so action-oriented. I got the idea to write this when I watched Marshall's first Ultimate Rescue episode. I loved it so much I couldn't leave it be. Of course, I don't know if the show would ever do a rescue as extreme as this. By the by, my knowledge of actual firefighting is decidedly limited, so in the event of any inaccuracies, I apologise. A good challenge for me, though._**

**_At any rate, this is officially the final one-shot in this collection. No more. I feel like some were better than others, but honestly, anthology writing SUCKS. I'll elaborate on that in the Afterword, which will be uploaded sometime between Wednesday and Sunday. If you've enjoyed this collection or any of the fics within, then I thank you deeply. So until the Afterword goes up, thanks again for reading. See you soon._**


	8. Afterword

_**So that's the last item off the list I wrote all the back in Primary Fears. Now, I feel the need to warn you, Afterwords are usually more positive than what's about to come. You may want to sit down. The next few lines are going to be more negative than usual.**_

_**Anthology. Writing. SUUUUUUUUCKS. I usually like to have a little freedom when it comes to writing the stories, so I tend to hop around from chapter to chapter, while watching out for inconsistencies of course. But here… I couldn't really do that. If I found myself hitting a wall with one story, I couldn't move on to another without forcibly emptying my brain of the setting for the previous fic and having to adjust to the setting of the new one. All these setting changes ended up messing with my concentration, and I feel like the fics suffered for it, even when I wrote all the dialogue in one go and wrote the rest of the fic around it. I just couldn't win when it came to trying to get focused writing these, even with my favourite fics (Boiling Over, Eruption and Movie Night in case you were wondering).**_

_**But sadly, it seems my opinions on Eruption were not shared. That fic seemed to mostly fly under the radar, and trust me, it did NOT feel good. As I said back then, if it weren't for the fact that I write everything in advance, the failure of my favourite story would've been a hammer blow to my motivation to finish the collection. In fact, the whole collection seems to have performed… weakly. At least in comparison to everything else I've written. Frankly, I'm glad this won't be my final performance before going dormant (more on that later).**_

_**Right, moving on from the negativity, I will say that I'm happy I got all of these concepts out of my head and onto paper (screen?). Particularly Boiling Over. The lack of comfort fics like it is… honestly surprising, I must say. I realise I may have messed up in writing Whatever it Takes (which was more meant to be an exploration of the pups acting out of character, a fact I actually forgot while writing it, stupidly enough), but I'm still glad I wrote it. It's just a pity that the collection didn't do as well as I'd hoped. But there are a couple of stories I'm proud of.**_

_**As an aside, there's someone I'd sincerely like to thank who you may have seen mentioned once or twice in my fics: Zojak. Aside from him making all of the covers for my fics (this one included) without me even asking, he's been incredibly supportive from the moment he made his account here, and even before that. In addition, he's been kind enough to proofread three stories (those being Boiling Over, Whatever it Takes and Eruption). He's been a real friend the whole time, and frankly, I can't thank the guy enough. And as always, to everyone who reviewed, favourited, followed and what-have-you, thank you all for following my stories.**_

_**And now for my future plans. I said at the start of the collection that this won't be the last thing I write here (which is good, since this would've been quite the whimper to end on). And that is true. Because THIS will be where I plan to end it. I still have enough in me for one more fic before going dormant. As for a future return… well, it's still very much in the cards. Bowing out isn't really due to lack of ideas as much as it is about trying to restore some balance to my life.**_

_**What will the fic be? Well, since I've been writing descriptions and titles for all of my other fics, I may as well give you one now:**_

* * *

_**REKINDLED ANEW**_

**Against the odds, it happened. Despite his seemingly-fatal accident tearing him away from his home, Marshall has safely returned to Adventure Bay. But scars run deep for the Paw Patrol, and Marshall's unbelievable return won't immediately heal everyone's trauma. Marshall soon realises that in order to truly put his nightmare behind him, he must first help everyone else do the same.**

* * *

_**Sound familiar? That's because this one is actually another sequel! This time to Relight the Fire. The more I thought about continuing the fic, the more I liked the idea, and the more I wanted to bring it to life. You won't have to read Relight the Fire in order to read Rekindled Anew, though. I plan to cover my bases on that account with a prologue. But fair warning: if you thought Relight the Fire was an emotional gut-punch, then Rekindled Anew will use your gut as a speed bag. This is quite possibly going to be the most depressing thing I write here, and the themes actually made me consider rating it T as opposed to my usual K. But you know me, there's always light in the darkness.**_

_**It may even break the record held by Primary Fears as the longest fic I've written, but nothing's set in stone… least of all the release date. My practice of not giving out concrete release dates shall remain in place for this one. But I'm looking forward to writing and releasing it, and I hope you are, too.**_

_**So once again, I hope you enjoyed Twin Sirens, and I hope you're looking forward to Rekindled Anew.**_

_**Until next (and potentially last) time:**_

_**PyreFly out.**_


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